


Game Point

by leftenant



Category: Kingdom Hearts
Genre: Aged-Up Character(s), Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Blitzball AU, Blitzball Player Riku, Blitzball Player Sora, F/M, Fake/Pretend Relationship, Getting Back Together, Honestly So Does Roxas, Kairi Ships It, M/M, Minor Cloud/Leon (Kingdom Hearts), Minor Naminé/Xion (Kingdom Hearts), Mutual Pining, Photographer Roxas, Publicist Kairi, Riku/Roxas Friends With Benefits, Roxas/Kairi Endgame, Sora and Riku Aren't the Ones Pretending, There Will Be No Infidelity Here, so much mutual pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-05
Updated: 2020-02-23
Packaged: 2021-02-26 16:20:04
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 41,125
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21881113
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/leftenant/pseuds/leftenant
Summary: After a very bad breakup, Sora and Riku are forced back into each other's orbit when Sora is recruited for the same professional blitzball team that Riku plays for. But it's fine. Sora is here to focus on the game, not on Riku. Or on Riku's snarky new boyfriend Roxas. Or on the fact that his feelings never actually went away. What could go wrong?ORA romantic comedy of errors in which Sora is in love with his ex-boyfriend Riku, who is (fake) dating Roxas, who has a crush on Kairi but thinks she's into Sora.
Relationships: Kairi/Roxas (Kingdom Hearts), Riku/Sora (Kingdom Hearts)
Comments: 72
Kudos: 189





	1. Blond Haired Kid

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know I promised to do a bunch of other stuff, but I was on deadline and 2019 goes on record as one of the worst years of my life. Now I'm not on deadline and it's 2020, but heavy plotting is the last thing I want to do! So, happy new year, have a light rom-com with fake sports in the background.
> 
> Note that despite the multiple pairings, this is first and foremost a Soriku fic, and the only ship having onscreen sex scenes will be them. However, sex between Riku and Roxas (and later between Roxas and Kairi) will be referenced, so I'm really earning that explicit rating up front.

It began with a Moogle alert.

Kairi had chosen this café for the meeting, which Sora wasn’t entirely convinced that he needed. He’d seen Kairi at work, he knew she was scarily good at what she did, but he had been recruited for the Destiny Island Explorers too recently to even believe the offer was real. He couldn’t imagine needing a publicist beyond the one that worked for the team. And, if he did need one, Kairi certainly didn’t have to bribe him with food to get him to hire her.

But she’d chosen this café, and a guy had to eat, so here they were.

Well. Here _he_ was. She was in the bathroom, a half-eaten salmon tartine abandoned next to her phone on the other side of the table.

Sora wasn’t one to go poking around on other people’s Gummiphones, especially not when they were basically making him an offer he’d be an idiot to refuse. But even upside down, he could read the familiar name when Kairi’s screen lit up and his fingers were reaching for it before he could stop them.

BLITZBALL’S HOT YOUNG STAR RIKU ESTHEIM IS OFF THE MARKET, the headline read, and that was all the information Sora could get without Kairi’s pass code. He set her Gummiphone back down and picked up his own, pulling up Moogle News. It was the top story, so he was treated to headline after headline:

BLITZBALL PLAYER RIKU ESTHEIM DATING UNKNOWN BLOND.

RIKU ESTHEIM CAUGHT IN LOVING EMBRACE WITH BLOND HAIRED KID.

WHO IS RIKU ESTHEIM DATING? EVERYTHING WE KNOW ABOUT THE BHK.

“ _Kid_?” Sora murmured, trying to imagine Riku with some wheat-haired teenager hopefully no younger than in their first year of university. Even that absurd image stung so much that he immediately pushed it away. It was none of his business who Riku was dating anymore. It hadn’t been his business for years.

He switched over to the image search and was treated to the same blurry image in different resolutions. Enlarging one showed Riku – tall and broad shouldered and muscular in ways only blitzball could make him – cupping the back of someone’s head as they stood in his doorway. Riku, bulging out of a white tank top, was fully visible except for the lower half of his body that was cut off by his new boyfriend. The so-called BHK had his back to the camera, up on his tiptoes in a nondescript black hoodie and grey cargo shorts, his hair curving up in blonde tufts like a succulent.

The picture didn’t tell Sora anything the headlines hadn’t, and yet he couldn’t stop staring at them. They looked good together. Riku looked good.

Riku had always looked good.

Sora jumped when Kairi returned to the table. Thankfully, she didn’t notice because she was busy grabbing a fistful of napkins from the dispenser. Her damp nails were painted the same lavender as her tailored blazer. Sora focused on that to avoid her piercing gaze.

“The bathroom’s out of paper towels,” she informed him, pressing the home button on her phone with a pinky and eyeing the screen with a small frown while she wiped her hands. Sora watched the frown deepen into a scowl. “ _Ugh_.”

He intended to say something innocent, something indifferent, like _what’s wrong?_ or _are you okay?_ But instead he blurted out, “Riku’s dating someone, huh?”

“Apparently,” Kairi said, tucking the wet napkins under her plate for safekeeping. Then her eyes flicked up to meet his. “Wait. Did you look at my—”

Sora quickly turned his Gummiphone around, conjuring up his most charming smile. “It’s all over Moogle News. See?”

Kairi made an exasperated sound, but at least she didn’t question him about her phone anymore. Her eyes had lowered again, her fingers flying across the touch screen keyboard. Sora had no idea if it was Riku she was texting, but all this attention almost made him bad for the guy.

Almost.

Kairi was outright ignoring him now, which made it hard for Sora to resist the siren call of Riku, always sitting there at the back of his mind. He had been trying not to think about Riku this whole time, and for the most part he had succeeded. He hadn’t thought about Riku during tryouts. He hadn’t thought about Riku when he’d gotten the call. He hadn’t thought about Riku when he’d signed the contracts. Up until today, he’d managed to banish thoughts of Riku to late nights, when his imagination barreled forward into a future when he finally got to play for his favorite team – the team Riku had been on for the last four years.

This was the first time he had even _asked_ about Riku, even though Kairi had been Riku’s publicist for about a year and a half. She was respectful of their breakup. She never brought him up, not even when she told Sora stories about work. She wouldn’t have brought him up now if Sora hadn’t brought him up first. Sora almost _wanted_ to talk about Riku now, because they were about two weeks out from the start of training and he and Riku were going to see each other face-to-face. Sora felt like he needed some kind of warning, some kind of preparation, some kind of reassurance that it would go better than the last time they’d spoken to each other.

The _last time_ they’d spoken to each other.

Instead, he’d gotten the news that Riku was dating someone young enough to be referred to as “kid” by the media. As far as he knew, this was the first time Riku had dated someone at all since they broke up. Not that Sora kept tabs on him or anything.

Sora picked at his plate, even though he’d stripped his lobster roll down to a single lettuce leaf and wayward celery already. “Kairi.”

“Mmm?”

“Does – Is he still mad at me? Do you think?”

That got her to look up from her phone, her crimson eyebrows knitting together. “Riku? He was never mad at you, Sora.”

Somehow, that made Sora feel worse instead of better. Kairi looked like she wanted to say something else, but then her Gummiphone lit up again. Whatever she saw on the screen made her scowl even deeper than before, and she pushed her chair out so she could stand.

“I’m sorry about this, but I’ve got to go.” Her fingers combed through her purse and she dropped more money on the table than would reasonably cover their meals. The action made Sora bite the inside of his cheek to keep himself from smiling. All through university, Kairi had worked as a waitress for pocket money. Ever since she’d started making bank, her tips had been large enough to reduce several servers to tears. “Think about what I’ve said, okay? You’re a publicist’s dream, so I wouldn’t be good at my job if I didn’t try to snatch you up early.”

“Yeah, yeah,” he said, standing up to give her a hug. “It was nice to see you, Kairi. Let’s get together again soon.”

“If training doesn’t kill you.” Her smile was fond and proud. “Congratulations. I always knew you’d make it!”

Sora smiled back, warm all over from how genuine her words were, how genuine her belief was. Kairi _had_ always believed in him, even when he’d stopped believing in himself. He knew before she’d even walked away that he was going to hire her eventually. His reputation couldn’t have been in better hands, no matter who the Explorers had on the payroll.

He settled back into his chair to call the server over for the check, and his eyes caught on his Gummiphone. Moogle News was still open to a dozen blurry pictures of Riku kissing that blond on what Sora assumed was his front steps.

Sora sighed and closed the app. It was going to be a long two weeks.

“Why the fuck,” said Kairi.

A waterfall of tabloids hit the coffee table, each of them bearing the same blurry photo that had been haunting Riku all morning. Beside him, Roxas fished one of the newspapers out from the pile and opened it to the comics section as if he hadn’t caused this entire mess.

Riku didn’t think Kairi would appreciate him pointing fingers, though, so he stayed quiet. Her expression seemed to suggest that they’d done this on purpose just to ruin her day, when _he_ was the one whose day had been ruined. His Gummiphone had been burning a hole in his pocket since he’d woken up to this, but he’d been too paralyzed with indecision to use it.

He hadn’t spoken to Sora in three years. Would it make him more of an asshole to call him to give him a head’s up about this or to not warn him at all? Was it stupid to assume that Sora would even care, or was it insensitive to carry on as if he wouldn’t? Did Riku really want their first conversation in _three years_ to be about his fuck buddy and not about Sora going pro the way he’d always dreamed of?

It was a mess, and _that_ much was at least Riku’s fault, and he had no idea what to do about it. So he was doing nothing.

His phone was in his pocket judging him.

When neither of them took the opportunity to say anything, Kairi sat down on the loveseat, her legs crossed at the ankles. Both of her ankle boots had stiletto heels with filigree leaves on them. She could definitely use them to kill him.

“How did this happen?” she asked in a more measured tone of voice.

Roxas rolled his eyes when Riku chanced a glance at him.

“Well,” Riku began. “He brought me coffee.”

Kairi gave him an unimpressed look, which was fair. Roxas was giving him the same look, which was also fair. He and Roxas had been sleeping together for about a year, maybe less, and neither of them were really the sentimental type. This wasn’t even the first time that Roxas had brought him coffee. It had been a perfect storm of factors that had led to the kiss shared round the world, and Riku barely had the energy to get into them right now.

“I brought him coffee and he pawed at me in the doorway,” Roxas finished for him when he failed to say anything else. “Not that I was complaining. How were we supposed to know there was some asshole with a camera around?”

They _should_ have known, though. The whole reason that Roxas had brought him the coffee in the first place was that someone had leaked the name of Riku’s favorite restaurant, and Le Grand Bistrot been swamped by blitzball fans hoping to catch a glimpse of him. It had only been a quick text from Roxas that had kept him in the house, and that text had given no indication that Roxas intended to come by, let alone to bring him coffee.

So, yeah, Riku had been so grateful that he’d tongued Roxas in the doorway, followed by a solid two hours of athletic sex once the coffee cup had been drained. But if he’d known some asshole with a camera had been around, he would have kept his tongue and hands to himself.

Kairi dragged a hand down her face. “Right. Well, have you two decided what you want to say about this?”

“Do we have to say anything?” asked Roxas. “Riku’s a blitzball player. They get laid on the regular. Surely, this is all going to blow over soon.”

“Maybe if Riku was any other blitzball player. But he’s four years into his career and a rising star on the Explorers. This is the first time he’s made the headlines for any reason outside of a match. The media has been waiting for a get like this since the second he was drafted, and you practically gift-wrapped it for them.”

There was absolutely no inflection to Kairi’s voice as she laid out the facts, her professional mask making it impossible to tell how she felt about the situation beyond the inconvenience. Though he’d known her almost as long as he’d known Sora, Sora had always been closer to her than Riku was. Sora was the one who could sense her moods and read her thoughts. Riku mostly put his energy toward being a good client these days.

For all the good that did.

“We need to control the story,” Kairi finished. “Before it inevitably gets any bigger.”

Riku winced internally. He should definitely call Sora. Until then… “So, what, I have to give an interview saying sometimes I have needs?”

Kairi looked like she was considering stabbing him after all. “Is that what you want the world to know about this? That you’re horny?”

“Clearly you’ve got a better idea,” Roxas said, throwing an arm around the back of the couch. Riku leaned into it, wishing mournfully for another coffee. “Why don’t you just tell us what you’re thinking instead of making us guess?”

“Fine.” Kairi’s gaze flickered between them and then seemed to sharpen. “You two could date.”

Riku waited for her to follow that up with details or a punch line, but she just continued to watch them from across the coffee table like they should be falling on the ground in gratitude or something.

He frowned. “You’re actually suggesting that we fake date our way out of this? How is that less complicated than just telling people I fuck sometimes?”

“I—”

“Wait, what’s in it for me?” Roxas asked, reaching the arm behind Riku upward so his fingers could ruffle Riku’s silver hair. “This is a good face, but is it good enough to ruin my reputation over?”

“ _Ruin_ your reputation?” Riku snorted. “You should be so goddamn lucky.”

“You’re the one getting lucky. I am a _catch_.”

“You got fired from your university coffee shop for drawing dicks in people’s foam.”

Roxas snickered. Riku held his own laughter in for as long as he could before he cracked, the ridiculousness of this entire stupid day crashing over him all at once.

As far as fake boyfriends went, he could do a lot worse than Roxas. At least they already got along, and they had been friends with benefits for long enough that they wouldn’t need to do much lying. He could even see the logic in Kairi’s suggestion. Wakka couldn’t go anywhere with anyone without there being a thousand articles speculating that he was dating them. The constant rumors had ruined his budding relationship with his last girlfriend, Lulu.

If the media thought Riku was in a relationship, he could escape that same fate. And there was no chance of any tabloid rumors ruining his relationship with Roxas. After all, they wouldn’t actually be in one.

“You know what?” he said at last. “I’m in if you’re in.”

Roxas’ lips curved into a smirk. “Ask me properly.”

Honestly, Riku should have seen that coming.

He rolled his eyes, but obediently climbed off the couch in order to take Roxas’ hand between both of his. “Roxas Caraway, will you do me the honor of being my fake boyfriend until such a time as the media learns to mind its own business and/or you find someone you want to date for real?”

“Eh,” said Roxas. “I guess.”

Riku snorted again, dropping back down on the couch next to him. Kairi looked bewildered, but then seemed to shake it off. Her smile, when it came, was only a little tired.

“Right… well… I’m glad that’s settled, but we should firm up the terms before we release a statement. We could get a lawyer involved, if you want a clear contract, but at the very least we should decide on a better exit clause…”

Roxas closed the door behind him and nearly tripped over Kairi, who was sitting on Riku’s front steps with a cigarette between her lips. Not a real cigarette, he noticed as he walked around her. It was a candy cigarette that she was sucking on with all the tense focus of a true nicotine addict.

He lifted his eyebrows. “I thought you left an hour ago.”

She patted the stair next to her in reply.

Roxas took the seat and then took the candy cigarette when she passed him one of his own. The silence between them wasn’t awkward, though he’d long stopped expecting them to be. The first time Kairi had caught him and Riku in bed together, Roxas had been naked from the waist down, taking three of Riku’s fingers like a champ, and Riku had been fully naked and fumbling with a slippery condom. Kairi had just stared at them from the doorway, sighed in a very put upon manner, and told them that they had better be wearing pants when she came back in an hour.

Riku had nearly died of embarrassment, but Roxas could respect a girl so good at her job that she didn’t even blink in that kind of situation.

He watched the candy cigarette wiggle as she nibbled on it until she turned her head and caught him looking. He played it off with a mischievous smile, his smile widening when her lips curved upward as if on instinct.

“ _God_ ,” she said, turning away. “What a day!”

“Come on.” He nudged her with a shoulder. “Let me buy you a drink. That photographer might still be around.”

That was how Roxas ended up in a booth at Le Grand Bistrot, sitting across from a woman staring into her rosé like it held the secrets to life. Kairi had shed her publicist skin, which Roxas thought of as akin to laying down armor after a siege. Her red bob, always so sleekly styled, was sticking up every which way from the number of times she’d dragged her fingers through it. Her mascara was starting to clump in the corners of her lashes. Her peach lipstick had faded to reveal the soft pink lips beneath. She’d even discarded her blazer, which was now thrown over the back of the booth cushion, and was left in a pleated sleeveless white top tucked into her navy skinny jeans.

She looked far less intimidating like this. More real. Almost accessible.

“ _You’re_ a photographer,” she was saying largely to her wine glass. “Why are you all such shitheads?”

“I’m not a paparazzo,” Roxas pointed out. “And, yeah, a lot of them are shitheads. But it helps if you remember that they have bills to pay, too. Maybe even families to feed. It doesn’t excuse anything, but it explains a lot.”

Kairi wrinkled her nose at him. “Must you be sensible?”

“What do you want me to do? Throw a hissy fit that some guy got a money shot of me kissing my fuck buddy? It won’t change anything.”

“Boyfriend,” she reminded him. “And _ugh_.”

Roxas chuckled at the pout on her face that made her look like a six year old who had discovered broccoli on their plate, rather than a twenty-five year old businesswoman. He reached for his camera bag only to remember that he didn’t have it with him; he’d left it at the base of Axel’s pullout couch with the rest of his bags while he looked for a new apartment. Freelance artistic photography as a career meant that Roxas spent more time roaming than settling, and Axel had long since given him the couch and a key. But he hadn’t anticipated needing his camera at Riku’s house. They didn’t exactly do anything he’d want _captured on film_.

Kairi’s eyebrows jumped in amusement. “I’m ranting about how much I hate photographers, so you try to take a picture of me?”

“Shut up,” said Roxas. “I have an eye for beauty.”

Her cheeks looked pink under the fluorescent light, but it was probably just the reflection from the rosé.

Two menus hit the table between them, and Roxas looked up to see Naminé Matoya standing beside the table, a black half-apron with the restaurant’s logo tied around her waist.

“Hi Kairi, hi Roxas. Do you know what you want to order or do you want to finally look at these?” she asked. If she’d seen the day’s news or recognized Roxas from the back of his head, then it wasn’t showing in her expression. Of course, that didn’t mean anything. Naminé had the world’s best poker face, and there was no way Xion wouldn’t tell her eventually.

Roxas glanced over at Kairi. “You’re the one with the busy schedule. Want to turn this drink into a dinner?”

Kairi pulled out her phone, swiping through whatever messages and alerts were cluttering the screen. Then she sighed and pocketed it again.

“You know what? That sounds nice. Yeah, let’s do it.” She reached out for a menu and started flipping through it, unaware of the smile that Roxas was trying so hard to hide.

Naminé bowed her head. “I’ll give you guys a few more minutes.”

She raised a pointed eyebrow at Roxas as she departed, which was enough to wipe the smile off his face. He hid behind his menu, his cheeks burning hot. If Naminé was giving him _looks_ , then he needed to rein it in.

But when he lowered his menu to find Kairi smiling sweetly at him, it was hard to remember that.

“Thanks for this,” she said. “I really needed this today.”

Roxas cleared his throat. “Yeah, anytime.”

Riku’s name flashed across the phone screen seconds before Sora dropped it on his face.

He’d been playing Barnyard Battle, because that was what you did after an emotionally trying day if you were Sora Leonhart. What else was he going to do? Deal with his feelings? Talk to Leon? Talk to _Kairi_? Yeah, no. There were bad guys to smash with hammers, and Sora was just the player to do it.

He winced and picked up his vibrating Gummiphone, rubbing his nose with his free hand as the screen continued to light up. It had been long enough since he and Riku had contacted each other that Sora had forgotten about the picture he had set for Riku. It was one that Selphie had taken of them when they were younger, maybe five and six, standing in the ocean. Their shoes were abandoned on the sand, and they were holding hands. Sora was pointing up at something in the sky and Riku had his head turned slightly, the camera catching the unbearably fond look on his face as he gazed down at Sora.

Sora had no idea what they’d been talking about, but this had been one of the photos that Selphie had sent him to convince him that his feelings for Riku had been returned for years. “He’ll never confess until you do,” she’d warned him. “And you guys are _killing me_ with all this UST!”

“Ust? What’s ust?” Sora had asked.

“ _Unresolved sexual tension_ , hello!”

It had taken him an additional year to work up the courage to tell Riku how he felt, but this picture had been a huge part of the push toward that first step. It flicked out of view as Riku’s unanswered call went to voicemail, snapping Sora out of his memories. He fumbled with the phone, nearly dropping it again in his hurry to call Riku back.

The busy signal mocked him. He had to try calling Riku back four times before it actually went through.

“Sora. Hey.”

Two simple words, and Sora’s heart kicked into overdrive. His tongue felt heavy in his mouth. Three years, and he couldn’t even speak.

“…Sora? Are you there?”

He sucked in a breath. “Yeah, hi. Hey.”

“Hey,” Riku said again. There was a pause during which Sora tried to read his tone and realized that he couldn’t, something so new for him that it almost sent him spiraling. “Look, I just wanted – First of all, congratulations. I always knew you’d go pro.”

“Thank you,” Sora said, a smile invading his face. “I… still can’t believe it, honestly.”

“I can. I hope you’ve been celebrating.”

Unbidden, Sora’s mind conjured an image of how they’d celebrated the day Riku had found out he’d been recruited for the Explorers. He’d pushed Riku down on the bed, sank to his knees, and sucked his cock down so deep that Riku had _literally_ screamed. Then, he’d let Riku press him flat on the mattress and fuck him hard, the first of many positions they’d contort themselves into that night. Sated and sweaty and smiling around midnight, Sora had kissed Riku soft and slow, murmuring, “I’m so proud of you,” against his lips.

“Your turn next year,” Riku, ever humble, had murmured back.

“Well,” Sora said now. “Leon and Cloud made these jerseys with my face on them. And Kairi and I had breakfast together, if that counts?”

Riku was quiet for a long moment. “Yeah, about that…”

Despite the opening, he lapsed back into silence. Sora checked the screen of his phone to make sure the call hadn’t dropped, but the seconds continued to tick by and Riku continued to say nothing. He let it go on for a little while longer before taking pity on his ex.

“You’re dating someone,” Sora said. “I heard. Unless the papers are wrong?”

He heard the hopeful note in his own voice and winced. The picture hadn’t left much room for doubt, and, anyway, it _shouldn’t matter to him_.

“His name is Roxas. Roxas Caraway. He and Axel have been friends for years, and he and I started hanging out, and one thing led to another…” Riku cut himself off before Sora could beg him to keep the details to himself. “It’s kind of new. I’m sorry you didn’t hear it from me first.”

Sora’s eyes focused intently on a flake of peeling paint on the ceiling. “You don’t have to tell me that stuff. It’s none of my business.”

“Oh. Okay.”

Riku’s tone gave nothing away, and this time Sora _did_ spiral. Questions crowded at the back of his throat. How had Riku and Roxas met? How new was “new”? How serious were they? How many hot guys did the Explorers captain know, anyway, and how many of _those_ had Riku been introduced to? He shoved them all back, trying to maintain his air of indifference about Riku’s love life.

“Listen, while I have you,” Sora rolled onto his side, the phone tucked between his ear and the pillow, lending an intimacy to the conversation that felt almost normal. “I wanted to say I’m sorry for – the way we left things. I know I wasn’t the easiest to deal with that last year and I’m just. If we’re going to be working together, I wanted to make sure I said sorry. I took a lot of stuff out on you, and it wasn’t fair.”

This wasn’t the way that Sora had necessarily wanted to say this or would have chosen to say this, but his chest felt lighter once the words were out. The longing was still there, would probably always be there, but the guilt born of words unsaid was finally shaking loose.

Riku’s voice was soft as he replied, “Thank you. I appreciate that. This feels like a conversation we maybe shouldn’t have over the phone, though.”

“No, I know. I just wanted to make sure I said that. I should have said it years ago.”

“Sora.” A sudden, rough note had entered Riku’s voice. He took a deep breath, and when he finally spoke he sounded normal again. “I’ll see you at practice, okay?”

“Two weeks,” Sora agreed. “Can’t wait to make you look bad.”

Riku’s chuckle wrapped around his heart and squeezed.

Even as they said goodbye, even as the phone call ended, Sora still felt warm for a full ten minutes before he remembered the existence of Roxas. But, he decided a moment later, it didn’t matter. He was happy just to have the opportunity to be Riku’s friend again. He missed his best friend, whether Riku was single or not. After all, Riku had always been his best friend first.

And maybe he and Roxas would become friends, too. Sora could always use more friends.

Feeling like he could breathe for the first time in forever, Sora let his eyes flutter closed. The life he had dreamed of was finally about to begin.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The next chapter will be posted on Sunday, January 12th. I hope you enjoyed!


	2. Practice Makes Problems

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sora gets a pep talk, Kairi gets a life, Roxas gets a shot, and Riku gets a kiss.

It began with a blitzball game.

They didn’t have enough people for a full team, let alone two, so they were making due with what they _did_ have. Tidus and Wakka were going up against Sora and Riku, while Selphie and Kairi watched from the shore – both to judge the winners and because you couldn’t pay either one of them to get in the ocean to do anything but swim or sail. Usually, Tidus insisted on being on Riku’s team while Wakka was happy to be on Sora’s team; it was a well known fact that whatever team Riku was on would win about 80% of the time, but Sora and Riku paired together made for a team that was 100% unstoppable. But Tidus had been doing enough extra drills with Wakka to feel cocky, so he was gracious enough to let Sora and Riku play together.

They wiped the ocean floor with Wakka and Tidus, 7-0.

“It’s not fair,” Tidus whined as he threw Wakka’s blitzball back to him so he could take it home for the day. “Sora and Riku have been married for, like, eleven years. How are we supposed to win against players that can read each other’s minds?”

Sora’s friends just said shit like that sometimes. It was another well-known fact around the island that Sora and Riku were _something_ , something maybe a little too close to be friends, and they got those kinds of jokes all the time. “Where’s your other half?” people would say. Or “You boys are just so cute together!” Or “When’s the wedding? Did I already miss it?” Riku never seemed bothered by the relentless teasing, but Sora had an internal meltdown every time, terrified as he was that Riku would notice that Sora was noticing him. Terrified that they got these jokes because Sora couldn’t hide his heart eyes to save his life.

Terrified that Riku was just waiting for him to actually say something so he could finally let him down easy.

But on that particular day, when Sora was fourteen years old, Riku said, “Thirteen years,” in response to Tidus’ teasing and every single one of Sora’s thoughts screeched to a halt. Like, with a literal _screeeeeeech_ that drowned out the lapping of the waves at his feet and the cries of the seagulls overhead and the scraping of everyone’s boats as they started preparing to leave the play island and head home for dinner. Sora’s entire world narrowed to those two words. The conversation had moved on, but Sora couldn’t. Sora didn’t want to.

He wanted Riku, and in that exact moment he was tired of not having him.

“Hey,” he said, grabbing Riku’s arm by the wooden stairs that led up to the dock to stop him from joining Kairi in her boat. “You mind hanging back for a bit? I need to talk to you.”

Riku smiled. “Yeah, sure.”

He told Kairi to head out without him, since they could just take Sora’s boat when they were ready, and she left with only mild suspicion.

The play island had gotten smaller as Sora had gotten big enough to realize it wasn’t as endless as it had seemed when he’d explored it as a kid. But with no one but himself and Riku on it, it seemed as vast as the entire universe. With only slight hesitation, he led Riku toward the shack that would lead to the land bridge that would lead to the smaller island where he, Riku, and Kairi usually watched the sunset under the shade of the paopu fruit trees.

His palms sweat the whole way. After all, Sora had never confessed his love to anyone before. He’d never loved anyone but Riku before. Puberty had more or less punched Sora in the stomach with a constant molten warmth whenever Riku smiled at him, and why would he look at anyone else when there was Riku? Sometimes, around Valentine’s Day, he’d get love letters from the other students, but even those had dropped off when he’d started high school. Somehow, everyone seemed to know about his Thing with Riku.

He hoped it really was a Thing. Or else he might have to throw himself into the water.

Riku kept quiet the whole way, even taking his usual position against the fallen palm tree trunk, staring out at the ocean. The setting sun painted his pale face in golds and crimsons, lending a halo of light to already angelic features. Sora’s heart lurched in his chest, every heartbeat sharp with the force of his longing. He had no idea how Riku couldn’t hear it.

His breathing shallow, his pulse racing in his ears, Sora moved to stand in front of Riku, trapping him between Sora’s body and the tree branch. Riku had half a head on him in height, forcing Sora to look up to meet those aquamarine eyes he loved so much.

“I, um,” Sora said. “So the thing is, I love you.”

“What,” said Riku. Which was not at all encouraging.

Sora’s cheeks burned, but he was too deep into this to back down now. And, anyway, he’d never met a challenge he didn’t want to face.

“You don’t have to love me back,” he stressed, because Riku’s already pale face had lost what little color it had. Sora stepped away to a more platonic distance, giving Riku back the space Sora was clearly unwelcome in. “I just – need you to know. How I felt. Feel. About you. But it doesn’t have to change anything—”

“You,” said Riku. And then: “ _What_.”

“I’m in love with you?” Sora took in the way that Riku’s cheeks were now a blazing red, the way his expression was less like a pet owner whose cat had presented him with a dead mouse and more like a toddler who couldn’t believe they’d gotten exactly what they wanted for Christmas. A smile dawned across Sora’s face. “Stop me if you don’t want me to kiss you, okay?”

But Sora never got the chance, because Riku leaned down and kissed _him_.

In hindsight, it was the worst kiss he’d ever had in the way that all first kisses were. In hindsight, it was also the best.

An hour later, when they drifted home from the play island under the winking stars, their fingers laced, their cheeks pink, and their tongues tasting of paopu and each other, Sora hoped that this was the start of something that would last forever.

It would be six years before he realized it wasn’t.

_[Roxas] i think they found me  
_ _[Roxas] https://www.kingstagram.com/roxrocks_/_

His week had been going too well. Talking to Sora again had put a certain spring in Riku’s step, one that made his mornings brighter and his workouts easier. Checking his phone as he walked into his apartment after his usual morning run provided a reality check that Riku probably needed.

He followed the link to Roxas’ Kingstagram and winced. As a lightly successful photographer, Roxas had had about two thousand followers, including Riku. Now, he had almost eleven thousand.

 **[Riku] i am so sorry  
** _[Roxas] relax, martyr  
_ _[Roxas] i’m racking up likes on photos i took with my first camera_

Riku snorted. Leave it to Roxas to see this as a business opportunity. In all the time that Riku had known him, Roxas seemed to have two moods: angry and indifferent. If anything did get under his skin, he hadn’t seen fit to let Riku know about it yet. He and Axel were so different that Riku constantly wondered how their friendship even worked.

Then again, people had often wondered the same thing about Riku and Sora.

Instead of pursuing the article that had revealed Roxas’ name to the world, Riku decided his time would be better spent dropping his phone on his nightstand and taking a shower. By the time he emerged in a cloud of steam, he had several more missed messages.

—EXPLORERS GROUP CHAT—

 _[Axel] something you wanna share with the class there riku  
_ _[Hayner] yeah who tf is roxas  
_ _[Axel] my bff and apparently rikus new bf  
_ _[Wakka] c’mon guys dont you know better than to believe everything you read ya  
_ _[Aqua] It’s really none of our business.  
_ _[Terra] Agreed.  
_ _[Seifer] i would love to talk about anything other than this lamer’s love life  
_ _[Axel] dont be BORING you guys this is TOP NEWS  
_ _[Tidus] im with them, we should stop talking about this, especially if we’re adding sora to this chat  
_ _[Axel] oh right_

_Sora Leonhart has been added to chat._

_[Axel] wait why do we have to stop because of sora  
_ _[Sora] hi?  
_ _[Aqua] Hello, Sora. Welcome to the team!_

Axel’s last message had gone unanswered, hopefully because Tidus had texted him separately, but everyone aside from him had joined Aqua in welcoming Sora to the group chat. Thankfully. Riku closed his eyes, running his towel over his damp hair as he tried to find the energy to deal with his teammates. But instead, behind his eyelids, he saw Sora.

Well, Sora as he’d been three years ago when Riku had last seen him in person. They still followed each other on Kingstagram, and had a lot of mutual friends, so he’d seen still shots of Sora and his unruly hair and his bright blue eyes and his stupid smile. But none of those pictures compared to how fascinatingly vibrant Sora was in person, how his every emotion showed on his face, how his tan cheeks grew adorably dark when he blushed, how he never seemed to stop moving even when trying to sit still. It was hard for Riku to believe he’d get to witness it all in person soon.

It was a second chance he’d stopped believing he’d ever get.

Once Riku was dressed again, he grabbed his phone and his heart skipped a beat. Because he’d gotten another new text message, this one from Sora.

_[Sora] is this ok? i can beg out of the group chat if ur uncomfortable_

Riku blew out a breath.

 **[Riku] no no i was just in the shower i wasn’t quiet because of you  
** _[Sora] in the shower?  
_ **[Riku] morning run  
** _[Sora] oh right i forgot_

Riku had no idea what to say to that. He wasn’t even sure how Sora meant it. Was he upset to have forgotten? Dismissive? Curious about the fact that Riku still took morning runs? Riku stood in the hallway between his bedroom and the kitchen, staring down at his phone like it was a puzzle he was trying to put together while unaware that he’d lost the final piece behind the couch ages ago.

 _[Sora] i’m just nervous i guess  
_ **[Riku] about the group chat?  
** _[Sora] about all of it  
_ _[Sora] i tried out every year for three years and didn’t make it until now  
_ _[Sora] what if it was a mistake_  
 _[Sora] what if they hate me  
_ _[Sora] what if i choke_

Sora was still typing, but Riku ignored that to call him instead. As soon as Sora picked up, he said, “It wasn’t a mistake, no one hates you, and you’re not going to choke.”

“How do you know that?” Sora whined, and he sounded so much like he had when they’d been growing up together that Riku had to smile.

“Because I know you,” he insisted. “Unless you’ve drastically changed over the last three years, you’re an amazing blitzball player. You have more friends than anyone would reasonably need in a lifetime. You’re an _amazing_ blitzball player.”

Sora chuckled. “You already said that.”

“It’s doubly true.”

Sora took a deep breath, but didn’t respond. Riku’s hand shook restlessly against the phone as he fought not to fill the silence. He’d stopped expecting this, and so he had no idea how to navigate what he’d tried to stop wanting. The quiet, tinny puffs of Sora’s breathing in his ear made him shiver even through the phone. It was pathetic. He was pathetic.

He wanted to be over this like Sora clearly was.

“I should go,” Sora finally said. It might have been Riku’s hopeful heart that made him think Sora sounded reluctant. “I know you’re—I don’t have—It’s not your job to talk me out of these spirals anymore.”

The words stung, not just because Riku wanted it to be his job, but because of what a reversal it was from their friendship. Sora had always been the one talking Riku down from his spirals, making Riku laugh even when it felt like he would never laugh again. Riku wanted to do the same for him. What’s more, he wanted Sora to want him to do the same for him.

He shook the thoughts from his head. He needed to get it together.

“Yeah, all right,” he said. “I’ll see you at practice.”

“See you.”

Riku set the Gummiphone down with a sigh, his stomach so twisted up that he almost wanted to skip breakfast. But it wouldn’t help anything to dwell. At least he and Sora were talking at all. He had to be happy with that.

Early into her career, Kairi hadn’t had much in the way of a work/life balance. Being the assistant to a celebrity publicist meant lots of late nights and coffee fetching and ceaseless anxiety. Sora had told her she looked terrible often enough that Kairi had gotten a futon so that, when she slept at the office, she wouldn’t have to stretch out on the couch in the reception.

Since she’d started taking on her own clients, things had gotten better. That was how she found herself at Elixir, sitting at the bar with Naminé Matoya and Xion Minwu for their weekly girls’ night out. Selphie had bailed on them because she had a date, but Kairi knew how to deal with being alone with Naminé and Xion. If you sat between them, they were lovely company. If you let them sit next to each other, you’d be third wheeling it all night.

“How’s Sora been doing?” Xion asked, her mouth blue from whatever mixed drink she’d ordered. “With the recruitment and everything?”

“Fine, last time we spoke.” Kairi took a long gulp of her ginger ale. She was designated driver, but she’d asked the bartender to spice it up by adding a maraschino cherry to the glass. “I’m more worried about the Riku thing.”

Naminé looked amused. “Yes, how is Roxas’ new boyfriend?”

Kairi toyed with the rim of her glass instead of answering. She hadn’t told Naminé and Xion about her strategy, and she wasn’t sure if Roxas had either. Xion, Roxas, and Axel had been friends in the way she, Riku, and Sora had been friends: grown together in Twilight Town, moved to Destiny Islands almost back to back to attend the same school, still in each other’s orbits even now. Naminé and Roxas had met in the same art symposium during college, and Roxas had thought they’d been lightly flirting with one another until he’d introduced her to Xion and the rest was history.

She’d known Naminé longer than she’d known Xion, but both girls were too perceptive for their own good. So it was no surprise that Xion was the one who said, “You’re over that crush you had on Sora, right?”

Kairi’s cheeks burned. That crush had been the most embarrassing part of her childhood. When she’d moved to Destiny Islands from Radiant Garden, Sora had been the first person who was kind to her, who made her feel included, who actually seemed to want her around for more than just that kindness. How could she not have fallen for him? How was she to know that the rest of the island was taking literal and metaphorical bets on when he and Riku would finally get together?

She’d gotten over that long ago. She _had_. But sometimes when Sora smiled a certain way or hugged her a little too long, her hindbrain began to wonder _what if_ …

But she would never do that, not to Riku and not to herself.

And that was _so_ not the problem right now.

“I just feel like this whole thing is going to blow up in everyone’s faces soon,” Kairi finally said. “Riku and Roxas making it official right before Sora and Riku will be spending time together again for the first time in years? It’s a recipe for disaster. Sora called me sobbing when Riku left him. _Sobbing_. What if he still loves him and Roxas is—? Or, worse, what if Riku still loves him and they—?”

“Kairi, breathe,” Naminé murmured, reaching over to rest a hand on her upper back. “You can’t spend this much time worrying about other people’s lives.”

“That’s kind of my _whole job_ , Naminé.”

“It really isn’t, though. You’re a fixer, not a puppet master.”

“That’s Naminé’s super polite way of saying that you need to get a life,” Xion stage whispered. Kairi glared at her. “What? It’s true! Every week we do this, and all you ever talk about is your clients or Riku or Sora or both. Get. A. _Life._ ”

Kairi winced because she wasn’t entirely wrong. “Where do I get one of those? Are they on sale at Galaxy Toys?”

“Let Selphie set you up on a date. She’s only been begging since forever.”

“Selphie? Selphie I-Take-Full-Credit-For-Getting-Sora-And-Riku-Together Tilmitt? I’m not letting her within three feet of my love life when she’s so delusional.”

“What love life?” she distinctly heard Naminé mutter. Kairi turned her glare on the blonde instead, who gave her an angelic smile that only made her look more suspicious.

“We’re only saying this because we care,” Xion said. “You need to get your nose out of other people’s business and get some business of your own.”

Kairi downed the rest of her ginger ale and stood. “Fine. You want me to get a life? I’ll get a life.”

She took a quick scan of the club. Elixir was a seaside nightclub that was often frequented by the rich and famous, especially blitzball players. Destiny Islands was too small and too community oriented to hike up the cover charge as a result, however, and so it was packed with as many average people as people in the VIP sections. Across the dance floor, in one of the window booths, was a man who looked shyly away when he caught her eye. She made a beeline for him, sliding into the other side of the booth.

“Hi,” she said demurely. “What’s a nice guy like you doing drinking alone?”

“Oh, I, uh.” Even under the strobe lights, Kairi could see that the man’s round cheeks were pink. He had spiky black hair held back by a black headband and was wearing a black and white shirt that said DOGSTREET. “I came with my friends, actually. They’re over there.”

Kairi followed his finger to the dance floor, where a woman with shoulder length brown hair was swaying to the beat with a tall blond man with spiky hair. Her eyes narrowed when she realized she recognized the man and she almost groaned. It was Hayner Kildea, a defender on the Destiny Island Explorers. Which meant that the woman was Olette Wylan, his best friend or secret wife, depending on which tabloid you chose to read, and that meant that the man across the table from her was Pence Figaro, their best friend or the third member of their polyamorous relationship. Again, depending on which tabloid you chose to read.

She sighed and sank back in her seat. “I should have known.”

“You’re Kairi Garland, right?” Pence said, leaning forward in interest. “Hayner said he tried to hire you, but you turned him down. Is that true?”

“He’s a hot head,” Kairi muttered. “I need clients who will work with me, not clients who will fly off the handle if Seifer Almasy so much as looks at them wrong. The Explorers nearly lost that match against the Twilight Town Dusks because he tried to take Seifer’s head off with the blitzball – and Seifer’s his own team’s goalkeeper!”

Pence laughed. “That’s Hayner all right. No one gets under his skin like Seifer does.”

That sounded suspect to Kairi, but honestly she didn’t care. She sighed again. “Well, do you mind talking to me for long enough that my friends think we’re on a date? They basically said I’m pathetic.”

“You?” Pence blinked. “But you’re so successful and clearly smart and, if you don’t mind me saying, you’re beautiful.”

Kairi melted. “Keep talking like that and we’ll end up on an actual date.”

Pence grinned at her, and Kairi grinned back, and she had to stop herself from turning to stick her middle finger up at Xion and Naminé. _See?_ she wanted to say. _I still know how to do this! Some guys still want me! Not Riku,_ me _!_

And then she immediately felt bad for the thought. It wasn’t Riku’s fault they had the same taste in guys, and it wasn’t Riku’s fault that every guy she’d ever liked had liked him first. And it definitely wasn’t Pence’s fault that he wasn’t the guy she wished was sitting across from her right now, smiling at her under the strobe lights and telling her that he thought she was beautiful.

Resolving not to make that his problem, Kairi sat up straighter in her seat and smiled again. “So, tell me about yourself.”

“Why are you so jumpy?” Axel asked as Riku and the rest of the team stretched by the practice pool.

Whenever they got a new player, they started with the pool before moving practice to the stadium; Riku assumed it was so they could make sure the newbie wouldn’t drown in there. The guys were still trailing in, slowly but surely, slapping the pool doors against the wall as they arrived. Riku was getting whiplash from looking up at every _boom_.

“I’m not jumpy,” he said, stretching out his left leg.

“You’re like a dog barking at every car that passes until his master’s comes home,” Tidus pointed out. “Is this about Sora?”

“I think it’s about the fact that his boyfriend’s here,” Seifer said, jabbing his head toward the stands, where Roxas sat with a book and his camera. At the moment, it was the book he was holding up, but that could easily change. “Since when are SOAPs allowed to come to practice?”

“Roxas isn’t a SOAP,” said Axel. Like Riku, he’d never quite liked the semi-demeaning term for Significant Others And Partners of blitzball players. “He’s one of my best friends. And who says he’s here for Riku? Maybe we’ve got plans after this.”

Roxas was, in fact, there for Riku, as Kairi insisted that it was important for the ruse for them to be seen spending time together with their clothes on. But Riku kept quiet and let Axel take this one. Under any other circumstance, Roxas would have been here for Axel anyway.

 _Boom_.

Riku’s head turned, and his heart stopped. Sora had finally arrived, wearing the regulation cerulean high-waist jammers and a pair of goggles on his head. His swim cap was in his hands, and a hesitant smile was on his face when everyone stopped to look at him. Riku couldn’t _stop_ looking at him. He was taller and tanner than Riku remembered, his hair shorter but somehow spikier, his eyes a brighter blue than any color Riku had ever seen before or since. His legs went on forever beneath the jammers, his dusky pink nipples standing out on his lithe, brown chest.

 _Oh my god,_ Riku thought faintly. _Oh, no._

“Hi,” Sora said what could have been hours later. He was standing in front of them, when Riku didn’t even remember him crossing the room. “Am I late?”

His eyes landed on Riku, and they stared at each other. Riku heard the distant rumble of someone speaking, but it was just that: distant. Sora’s eyes were so intense, so very dark, and Riku had no idea what Sora was seeing on his face, but it probably wasn’t what would be on the face of someone who had a boyfriend and was totally over his ex.

_Fuck. Oh, fuck._

Sora’s gaze moved on, releasing Riku from whatever the hell that had been. He returned to his stretches and didn’t look at Sora again, his heart pounding loudly in his chest. He could feel eyes on him and looked up and up, into the stands, where Roxas was watching him over the top of his camera. Riku’s pulse kicked up another notch. What had he gotten a picture of? Roxas grinned and wiggled his fingers at him, and that just made Riku even more nervous. Whatever shot he’d gotten, it was _bad_.

“—tches, and then we’re going to do some laps, and then we’re going to run some plays,” Axel was explaining to Sora, who was sitting next to him. If sitting was the right word. Sora was, in fact, doing a full split, which Riku had forgotten he could do until now. “This stuff is just for practice. I’m sure you know we wear nothing but our uniforms and a smile in the stadia.”

“When’s the first match?” Sora asked.

“Not for a month and a half. Usually, we’d do draft at the start of the off-season, but the Dusks fleeced Yuffie out from under us unexpectedly, so we had to do emergency tryouts.” Axel raised his voice to be heard above the booing and grumbling that followed both the name of the Dusks _and_ Yuffie these days. “You were a godsend when we recruited you, so I don’t think you’ll be at a disadvantage for only having trained with us for a few weeks before your first game.”

Sora ducked his head and smiled so sweetly and so shyly that Riku felt himself spontaneously combust. He finished his stretches and stood. “I’m going to start my laps early. If that’s okay?”

“Yeah, whatever, man,” Axel said easily. “Ever the overachiever.”

“He’s always been like that,” Sora replied. “Since we were kids.”

“Did I ever tell you about the time he wiped the floor with me and Tidus and Selphie with nothing but a wooden sword?” Wakka chimed in.

Riku dived into the pool both to avoid this conversation and to avoid the near-constant state of longing his body seemed to be in. He was never going to renew his friendship with Sora if he couldn’t be around him without wanting to touch him, and he hadn’t had the right to touch him for three years. That was half the time they’d spent dating. Sure, he’d spent more of his life touching Sora than not touching Sora, but surely he would have gotten used to the loss by now.

When he emerged from the other side of the pool, it was to a flash.

He sputtered, wiping water out of his eyes to see Roxas kneeling in front of him, his camera hanging around his neck again.

“Looking good out there, baby,” Roxas cooed, rocking forward to kiss Riku. It was a relatively chaste kiss, a soft brush of lips combined with Roxas’ hand sliding around the base of his neck to hold him steady and Roxas’ fingers sliding through the baby hairs he found there. Roxas pulled back, brushed their noses together, and then leaned in for one last peck that made warmth flutter through Riku’s body. “Sorry. I can't resist you all wet and half-naked like this.”

Riku couldn’t help but smile. “Why don’t you just piss on me so he _really_ gets the picture?”

“I didn’t know you were into that,” Roxas murmured, his eyes bright with mischief. “I gotta say, that’s a kink you’re going to have to explore by yourself, because that’s a hard no from me.”

“Is that the only hard thing I’m getting from you today?” Riku asked and then burst into laughter at the look on Roxas’ face. “I had to! You set it up so perfectly—”

_“RIKU! HANG OUT WITH YOUR BOYFRIEND ON YOUR OWN TIME! GET BACK TO WORK!”_

Roxas released him and Riku ducked back down into the pool, throwing an apologetic look at Axel over his shoulder. Everyone seemed to have arrived by now: Aqua, hiding a smile; Terra, glancing at the ceiling to give him privacy; Hayner, giving him a double thumbs up; Seifer and Axel, glaring at him from across the pool; Tidus and Wakka, both looking to their left; and Sora, standing there with his face unreadable as he stared right at Riku and Roxas.

The warmth Riku had been feeling immediately froze over.

He dived back beneath the water and returned to his laps, but no matter how hard he pushed himself, he couldn’t escape that inexplicable, unforgettable look on Sora’s face.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The next chapter will be posted next Sunday. Hope you enjoyed!


	3. We Need to Talk

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Conversations aren't the only hard things going on here. Riku and Sora come to an understanding that will only last about one chapter. People continue to not play blitzball in this Blitzball AU.

This had been a mistake.

Sora raced into the locker room ahead of the rest of the team. His cheeks were burning. His breathing was short. His pupils were surely dilated. He didn’t think he’d ever been this turned on in his _life_ , which was truly saying something considering his relationship with Riku had begun around the same time that a light breeze had been enough to give him a boner.

He stripped and climbed into the shower furthest from the unlocked door. Cool water splashed his skin when he turned the knob, but it did nothing to quell the heat that lit up his skin. He didn’t have much time before the rest of the team would follow. What if he was caught? The smart thing to do would be to take a cold shower and wait until he got home to do anything else.

But he didn’t think he could make it that long.

He had a hand wrapped around himself a second later. _Fuck_. The molten relief of it almost made his knees buckle. Sora placed a hand against the tiled wall of the shower to keep himself standing, his breath hissing out as he stroked himself once, slowly, slick precome beading at the tip of his cock. This had been a mistake. _Why_ had he thought that he could be on a blitzball team with Riku and not feel like this?

His first practice had been a torturous onslaught of images now permanently burned into Sora’s retinas. Riku, stretching out one muscled leg, bare from the waist up. Riku, staring at him with those intense blue-green eyes, trapping the breath in his lungs. Riku, emerging from the chilly water of the pool, dripping and glistening under the overhead lights.

It had taken everything that Sora had not to get hard right there in the middle of the crowd of blitzball players that he wanted to accept him as their own. There was nothing stopping him now, nothing but the nagging awareness that he had minutes, maybe _seconds_ , before the locker room would fill with people. Before someone might figure out what he was doing.

His hand moved in a blur over his dick, stroking faster and squeezing harder than he normally did at home, pulling muffled cries of pleasure from Sora’s throat. He swirled his thumb against the slit, spreading pearly drops of precome around to make the slide even smoother, biting his lip to trap his moans inside. The head of his cock was ridiculously sensitive, something Riku used to use to tease him for hours.

His mind fell back, back, back into endless memories of being in bed with Riku – or not in bed, as the case may be. Once, Riku had hoisted Sora up on the counter in the kitchen and sucked an angry red mark onto the side of his neck while jerking Sora off quick and dirty. When Sora had come with a guttural cry less than a minute later, Riku had pressed a gentle kiss to his collarbone and murmured, “I just missed you today, that’s all.”

Another time, Sora had gasped his way out of a hazy dream to find Riku with two fingers buried in Sora’s hole and Sora’s dick hitting the back of his throat. Sora had practically sobbed his way to orgasm, then flipped Riku over to return the favor. When they’d caught their breaths, Sora had thrown a leg over Riku’s hips and rode him slow, their fingers interlocked, their eyes on nothing but each other.

Sora’s chest heaved, heat pooling in his stomach as he imagined Riku here, now. In a world where they had never broken up, maybe they would have hurried away to the locker room together. Maybe Riku would have him pinned to the damp shower walls right now, Sora’s legs wrapped around his waist, their cocks sliding together, sparks of pleasure jolting up Sora’s spine.

His labored breathing sounded loud in the empty locker room as he squeezed the crown of his cock again, picturing Riku’s pale hand there instead, the way he’d push Sora right to the edge and then grip the base of his dick to keep him from coming. The way Sora’s orgasm would stall as a silent scream in his throat, the way he’d throw his head back as his entire body trembled with the need to come, the way Riku would lick and nibble his way across Sora’s throat.

He bit his lip to keep Riku’s name from spilling out as he came, splattering sticky white across the shower wall. His cock continued to twitch as he emptied himself, imagining Riku’s warm breath and warm voice at his ear, the way he’d whisper, “That’s it. Fuck, Sora, you look so good like this.”

“ _So good_ ,” Sora whispered with a final, throaty gasp. Exhausted, he leaned against the wall and watched the water carry most of the mess away. He was too tired for the guilt to have a chance to settle in, too tired for his brain to remind him that Riku was no longer his to fantasize about.

Then he heard the _boom_ of the locker room door opening, the cacophony of voices rising, and his entire body froze as reality hit him all at once. He’d just masturbated to the thought of someone else’s boyfriend in a public shower in the locker room he shared with the new blitzball teammates he’d just met three hours ago.

 _What the fuck is wrong with you?_ he thought, and, ah, yes, there was the guilt. _This is a new low, Leonhart._

Sora quickly washed the last of his mess away and then just as quickly washed himself before turning off the shower. He’d take a more thorough shower when he got home, but there was no way he could properly clean himself now without raising suspicion. When he stepped out to wrap a towel around his waist, he avoided everyone’s gaze for fear of seeing Riku among them. The last thing he needed was to somehow get hard again while wearing nothing but a towel.

Or, worse, for Riku to see him and know _exactly_ what he’d been doing because he was the only one here intimately familiar with what Sora’s post-orgasm face looked like.

His cheeks burning all over again, Sora hurried to his locker to get the hell out of here. This had been a _mistake_.

Roxas was waiting for Riku in the hallway outside of the locker room, idly flipping through Kingstagram. His follower count had jumped up another ten thousand, and Kairi had suggested he make another, private one and keep this his professional one. Roxas wasn’t sure he was ready to take that step; he’d had roxrocks_ as long as he’d had a Kingstagram and he was kind of attached to it.

Then again, someone had responded to one of his old photos of himself, Axel, and Xion pressing cheek to cheek into frame with, “wtf r u doing w these people u whore riku deserves better kill urself.” So maybe she had a point.

He looked up as the door opened and scowled. Because instead of Riku, the person making their way out was none other than the infamous Sora Leonhart, the unknowing bane of Roxas' existence. Sora was looking at his own phone, so Roxas took the opportunity to observe him, his scowl deepening.

The thing was, there wasn’t anything special about Sora. Yeah, all right, he was cute. Spiky mud brown hair. Eyes the blue of toilet bowl cleaner. Skin the kind of tan you could probably get from a bottle. He and Roxas looked to be about the same height, and he was wearing a scarlet hoodie with Mickey Mouse on it with black skinny jeans and red hightops. He looked like five hundred other guys Roxas had seen on the streets of Destiny Islands since he'd moved here, and yet so many people's worlds seemed to revolve around him. What a tool.

“Hey,” Roxas called when it looked like Sora was going to walk right past him without noticing him.

Sora glanced up, his face leapfrogging through a series of expressions before he seemed to settle on a smile. “Hey. Roxas, right? Nice to finally meet you!”

He sounded sincere about it, which Roxas knew had to be bullshit. He’d seen the way that Sora watched him and Riku when they'd kissed. Hell, he’d seen the way Sora had watched Riku every time he thought he could get away with it during practice. There was no way that Sora didn’t want some unfortunate accident to befall Roxas so he could swoop in and console Riku with his dick or something. No. Way.

“Wish I could say the same,” Roxas said, feeling a sick sense of satisfaction when Sora’s smile flickered. “But it’s hard for me to be glad to meet people who just spent the last three hours perving on my boyfriend.”

Sora’s cheeks flared a guilty red. “I—That’s not—”

“What? True? Are you really going to stand here and lie to my face?”

The blush darkened. “No, of course not. I just meant I wouldn’t, um. I would never actually…” Sora shook his head as if to clear it. “Look, I’m sorry. I don’t know if Riku’s ever talked to you about me, but we have kind of a complicated history and I didn’t mean to… to react to seeing him again that way. It was really disrespectful, and it won't happen again.”

Roxas opened his mouth and then closed it with a quiet snap. Because he had no idea what the fuck he was supposed to say to that. Sora’s unexpected apology had hobbled his rage; worse, it made him feel a little guilty. He’d actively tried to upset Sora by kissing Riku in front of him when he didn’t even like Riku beyond friendship, and Sora, who clearly _loved_ Riku, was apologizing to _him_ for just looking? But then the rage returned with a vengeance. He shouldn’t have to feel guilty about _anything_. Whatever game Sora was playing, Roxas wasn’t going to fall at his feet like Riku and Kairi. He refused.

“Thanks, that totally makes it better.” Roxas slid his phone into his pocket so he could fold his arms and look Sora up and down. “For what it’s worth, Riku didn’t tell me you guys had a complicated anything.”

That was a lie. Roxas would have had to have been blind, deaf, and dumb not to know that Sora was a still bleeding wound in Riku’s psyche. It had been one of the first things they ended up talking about after the sex. But he only knew a few details from talking to Riku and Kairi, and, anyway, he was curious about what Sora had to say about it all.

“Oh,” said Sora. He worried his lower lip. “Oh, okay. Well. I mean, it doesn’t really matter. He’s with you now, and you guys look really happy together. I’m happy for him. And you.”

Again, the words rang true. Sora truly didn’t seem to have an insincere bone in his body. He was even smiling now, like a puppy hopeful that it was about to be fed but glad to be around its master even if it wasn’t. Infuriatingly likable, that’s what he was. The more Roxas searched for something to hate, the more Sora disarmed him.

Next to him, Roxas felt like a coiled ball of resentment and bitterness waiting to spread his misery as far as he could. Maybe it was no wonder that the only person Roxas had ever liked had liked Sora first.

“Are you?” Roxas asked, and, though the question was genuine, he could hear the scorn in his own voice. He couldn’t help the barbed words that burst out any more than he could have stopped himself from poking at this wound in the first place. “Because you know what I think? I think that if Riku and I broke up right now, you’d be on him so fast that that he’d get dick whiplash. I think you resent me for having him when you don’t, and I think you actually hate me. So why don't you just cut the bullshit?”

Silence rang between them, louder than his words. He expected, just based on what he’d seen of Sora so far, for the man to wilt. To flinch the way he’d flinched at being called out for perving on Riku. To run, maybe, now that he’d seen that Roxas was not willing to be charmed by him. Sora seemed like that type. Soft.

Instead, to Roxas’ surprise, Sora scowled at _him_. Sora’s face hardly seemed to know how to support one; it screwed up his features until he looked more like a fairy from _Peter Pan and Wendy_ – only able to hold one emotion in his body at once. His eyes blazed with his anger, brighter than they had ever been, taking Roxas aback with their intensity.

Sora clearly had more fire in him than Roxas had thought.

“ _Look_ ,” Sora snapped. “I don’t know what’s going on with you, but don’t project your shit onto me. What do you expect me to say to that? That I don’t still love him? Well, sorry, but I do, and I probably always will. But I’m not an _asshole_ , and Riku isn’t some prize we can exchange between us. He’s with _you_ , and I respect that. If you’re _this_ insecure about your relationship, that’s on you, not me. I have enough of my own baggage without carrying yours.”

Roxas stared at him, but even without a return volley Sora didn’t back down. He continued to glare at Roxas until the door behind them opened to admit Riku into the hallway.

Riku read the mood in the hallway in seconds, his silver eyebrows knotting together. “Should I be worried about whatever just happened here?”

“No,” Sora said, still scowling. “I’m leaving anyway.”

He turned and was gone without another word. Roxas watched him until he disappeared around the corner toward the front entrance. Then he finally looked at Riku, his own eyebrows lifting.

“You know what?” he mused. “I think I finally understand why you’re so obsessed with that guy. He’s kind of hot. You think he'd be interested in a threesome?”

“Wow, shut up,” Riku snorted. “Seriously, what just happened?”

“Seriously, don’t worry about it. Worry about getting some food in me instead – and don’t you dare make another dick joke.”

A week after they met at the club, Kairi found herself at the Central Island Gallery with Pence, trying to pretend she was having a good time.

Pence wasn’t the problem. Pence Figaro was not only an absolute sweetheart, but also one of the smartest guys that Kairi had ever met. Instead of taking the traditional tour through the art museum, he took her to see every painting in the building that had a story about being cursed or haunted. It was way more fun, and Kairi had certainly never laughed so much in her life. But it was a complete waste of a high-waisted mini-skirt, because this felt more like a hangout than a date.

But she knew Pence wasn’t the problem. She was the problem.

Her stupid feelings were the problem.

“Hey,” he said as they stopped before a painting of a tidal wave that seemed to have a face hidden in its murky depths. “You’ve been quiet. Are you all right?”

“Yes,” she said. “Sorry, I just… I’m just tired.”

It _had_ been an exhausting week. Pictures of Roxas and Riku exiting the blitzball practice gym together, pictures of Roxas and Riku having an affectionate lunch together, pictures of Roxas and Riku kissing on Riku’s front porch – all of those had seemed to dominate the news cycle for days. Riku had eclipsed Axel as the most talked about member of the Explorers, something Axel seemed to find amusing.

“Sometimes I find the most ridiculous tabloid stories and text them to Roxas,” he’d told her before practice one day. “There’s this one about how he’s secretly a foreign prince. I’ll send it to you. It’s amazing.”

But while Axel, and even to some extent Roxas, were entertained by the attention, Riku was growing increasingly grouchy. He’d never liked attention, even when they were kids. He’d show off, yes, but he was only showing off for one person. The rest of the time, he would sit away from everyone else, on the island-off-the-island, watching the sunset alone until she or Sora joined him. If he wasn’t with Roxas, he was at home, hiding from the cameras and the journalists and his own famous friends.

Kairi was starting to worry that she had underestimated the public’s interest in him. What if his fake relationship with Roxas made them more interested over time instead of less? What if this was the first big screw-up of her career?

“We can go, if you want,” Pence was saying. His ever-present smile seemed to have dulled at her obvious disinterest. “Or if you need to sit down—”

“Kairi? Oh, hey. Pence... Figaro?”

Her heart seized for just a moment. It was Roxas, standing in the doorway to the exhibit room, his camera dangling over his chest as usual. His hair was windswept, and he was wearing a pair of grey cargo shorts and a black and white checkered t-shirt with a red collar. A pair of sunglasses sat near his hairline.

Pence had crossed the room to him, and they were shaking hands. “That’s me. Roxas Caraway, yeah? I follow you on Kingstagram. Your photos are amazing, dude.”

“Thanks,” Roxas grinned. “I didn’t know you knew Kairi.”

“We just met actually—”

“What are you doing here?” Kairi blurted, drawing both men’s attention back to her.

Roxas tapped his camera. “I’m doing a show here next month. I just had to sign some contracts and work some things out with the director.”

Kairi stared at the camera blankly for a moment, as though she had entirely forgotten what one was for. Then she realized she was now staring openly at Roxas’ chest and dragged her gaze back up to his face. If he’d noticed, his expression wasn’t showing it. Instead, he was smiling a fond, lopsided smile at her, the one that almost made her heart seize again.

It suddenly became very important for Roxas not to know why she and Pence were here. So of course that was his next question.

“Just checking out the art!” Kairi near-screamed before Pence could answer. And then she cringed, because she didn’t want Pence to think she was ashamed to be here with him or something. She gave him a smile that felt more like a grimace. “Pence was telling me about the ones that are rumored to be cursed.”

Roxas raised an eyebrow. “Oh?”

“Yeah,” Pence drawled, and she could feel his eyes burning holes into the side of her face. “But I think I’m going to take off now. I’ve actually got plans with Olette after this.”

Roxas’ other eyebrow joined the first, but he didn’t say anything to stop him.

Red-faced and ashamed of herself, Kairi followed Pence toward the entrance, waiting until they were out of Roxas’ earshot to say, “I am _so_ sorry—”

“No worries,” he said easily. “I could kind of tell even back at Elixir that you were working through something. Having feelings for your client’s boyfriend, though? That’s rough.”

Kairi’s head felt like she’d dipped it in magma. “What? I don’t—I don’t have feelings for Roxas! We’re friends.”

“Okay,” Pence laughed. “But you totally do. You should’ve seen the way you were looking at him.”

“I _don’t_!”

“Which, come to think of it, was pretty close to the way he was looking at _you_.”

“He doesn’t—that’s not—”

“Which begs the question of why he’s dating Riku, but, you know, that’s your business.”

The reminder that Roxas and Riku were dating made Kairi deflate from her self-righteousness denial. She wondered how Pence would react if he knew that Roxas and Riku were faking it or that they were faking it because of her. He'd already picked up on too much. She averted her eyes in case he’d read that off her face, too.

“I’m sorry,” she said miserably. “I should never have agreed to come here with you. You’re just such a great guy, Pence, and I wanted to like you so bad.”

“I get it. I’m a catch.” Pence winked at her. “And better to get this out in the open now than, like, when I asked you to be my girlfriend or you called me Roxas while we were kissing.”

“Oh my god, shut _up_.”

Pence left laughing, and Kairi let him have that one. She definitely deserved it.

She half-expected Roxas to be gone when she returned, but there he was, leaning against the arch of the doorway and going through the photos on his camera. He frowned at her. “I thought you were leaving with Pence?”

“Oh. No. Do you want me to leave...?”

“Nah,” Roxas said. Was it her imagination or did he say that a little too quickly? “If you’ve got time to kill, I can show you where my show’s going to be. You’re invited, obviously.”

“Obviously.” Kairi smiled.

Roxas returned her smile, and the part of her that constantly reminded her how stupid it was to spend time with him alone withered into silence. That fucking smile turned her into a fucking idiot.

But she could worry about that later. “Lead the way.”

Of all the people that Riku could have opened the door to see standing on his porch, Sora wouldn’t even have been his last guess. It was so unlikely that he rubbed his eyes, wondering if he’d fallen asleep on the couch. But when he finished, Sora was still standing there, shifting his weight from foot to foot and looking better in a blue t-shirt and red jeans than any person had any right to.

“Hi?” Riku said.

“Hey. Hi.” Sora rubbed the back of his neck, a familiar nervous gesture. “Could I talk to you? I mean, are you busy?”

Even if Riku had been doing something more intensive than copying Le Grand Bistrot’s seafood tartare for dinner, he would have cleared his schedule for this. He found himself glad that Sora didn’t know that. It was probably for the best that Sora thought he had no control over Riku anymore.

“No, I’m not busy,” said Riku. And then he paused, because there seemed to be no good choices here. If he offered to take a walk with Sora so they could talk, there was a chance they’d be photographed together. He couldn’t imagine Kairi’s face if he was at the center of cheating rumors already. Even having Sora on his porch for this long was pushing his luck. But if he invited Sora inside – if they were alone together in the same house they’d once lived in together – then that seemed… dangerous. Then again, they would have to learn to be alone together eventually, if they were going to play for the same team. “Why don’t you come in?”

He led the way to the kitchen, Sora following behind him as quiet as a ghost. Riku tried to see the place through Sora’s eyes, cataloguing all the things that had changed in the last three years. He’d taken down all the pictures of himself and Sora together, even the ones that had other people in them; they were all in a box in the hall closet with the rest of his things that reminded him too much of Sora to keep. He’d also replaced the couch they’d been sitting on when he’d told Sora that he wanted to break up and offered to find a new place. Sora had pointed out that _he_ was the one who could go live with his dads and promised to move out within the week. After that, Riku hadn’t been able to stand looking at the thing, couldn’t, in fact, look at it without seeing the broken expression on Sora’s face when Riku had gotten up to sleep in the guest room.

Riku had even gotten rid of the kitchen table. He and Sora had fucked on it so many times that they’d broken it, and Sora had replaced the leg with one made from a different wood as the rest. “To commemorate our achievement,” he’d said with a catlike grin, wood shavings in his hair.

“I was just in the middle of making dinner,” Riku said. “You’re welcome to have some, if you. If you’re hungry.”

“No, I won’t be here that long. I just—Remember when you said this was something we should talk about in person?” Sora sank gingerly into one of the chairs around the new table, his eyes on the clear mahogany surface. “Is now okay, or…?”

Riku froze with his hands on his bowl of sauce and had to force himself back into motion. “Oh. Yeah, sure. Should I sit down, too?”

“No, this is fine.” Sora was quiet for a moment. “First of all, I wanted to apologize again. Like I said, I took a lot of stuff out on you and I know I wasn’t easy to live with and—”

Riku turned away from his mixing, facing Sora at last. “Hey, come on. It’s not all your fault. I want to apologize, too. I never figured out how to be what you needed me to be, and I gave up on us long before I ever left. You always believed in us, but when push came to shove I proved I never did. So _I’m_ sorry. I’m really sorry, Sora.”

Sora finally looked up at him, and their eyes locked. But instead of the crackling intensity of the poolside, there was only sad acknowledgement.

“I forgive you,” Sora said with a small smile. “I’ve been seeing that therapist you recommended? She’s been really great for helping me work through my issues with tying my entire sense of self-worth to my ability to play blitzball and everything. I’m doing a lot better, so. There’s that.”

Riku managed a smile of his own. “I’m… really glad to hear that.”

“Thanks.”

“How long have you been…?”

“Since, like, a month after you—after I moved out.”

Riku bit the inside of his cheek to keep from asking the one question he’d wanted to ask since Sora had turned up on his doorstep. He should be happy with just this. He’d forgotten what it was like to be able to talk to Sora without the fraught silences and the unspoken resentment. He remembered the weeks after Sora hadn’t been drafted at tryouts, whole days going by during which Sora couldn't be convinced to get out of bed. He remembered the way Sora’s smiles never reached his eyes when Riku tried to cheer him up with gifts bought with the money he’d earned playing blitzball. He remembered the guilt that curled in his chest when he left for away games, right next to the relief that he wouldn’t have to deal with their deteriorating relationship for a few days.

He remembered wishing he’d never made the damn team in the first place, if only because he seemed to be a constant reminder of everything Sora couldn’t have, no matter how hard Sora tried to hide it. He remembered sitting in a silent hotel room, breathing through the heartbroken acceptance that it was only a matter of time now, staring down the realization that he’d always expected their relationship to end, even if not exactly like this. He remembered finally being the one to break up with Sora for what he'd thought was Sora’s own good, because Riku had walked away knowing he would never love anyone else.

At one point somewhere in there, he _had_ begged Sora to consider talking to someone, someone who could help him the way Riku obviously couldn’t. “Sure,” Sora had mumbled, and never gone.

Until, apparently, a month after Riku broke up with him.

“Why didn’t you call?” he asked. Immediately, he wished he hadn’t, but the question was out and he had to commit to it. “It seems like you’re in a better place now, right? And I was… I mean. You could have called. I would’ve been happy to hear from you.”

Sora winced, like he’d been hoping that Riku wouldn’t ask. “I wanted to. Believe me, I did. But I didn't want to drag you back into my shit until I'd sorted it. And even if blitzball isn’t my whole identity anymore, it’s still important to me, you know? I kept going to tryouts every year and not making it and feeling like I’d taken two steps back because I still got so upset and – therapy helped. It was helping. But then I _did_ make it and I thought, well, I couldn’t call you _now_. If I’d called you and we’d, you know, then I didn’t. I thought you might always worry that if something happened, if I got kicked off the team for whatever reason or if you were more successful than me, we’d be right back in that place again.”

Riku’s heartbeat thudded in his ears. “Oh.”

“Yeah.” Sora rubbed the back of his neck again. “And now you’re with Roxas, and I’m really happy for you. I hope you know that. I’m glad you’re moving on. It’s just things have been feeling kind of weird at practice, especially after that first day, so I wanted to make sure we both got closure. So we can put this all behind us and maybe be friends again.”

“Right.”

“If – If that’s what you want. I don't want to assume...”

The last thing that Riku wanted was to put their relationship behind him, but he couldn’t very well _say_ that. He cleared his throat instead. “Yeah, that would be great. I miss being friends.”

Sora’s smile, when it came, was as bright as a sunny day. “Me, too. Okay, cool. Good talk. I’m going to head home before Leon and Cloud call the cops.”

Riku walked him to the door, but, before Sora could turn the doorknob, Riku was hugging him from behind. It was an involuntary gesture, one he hadn’t known he was going to make until he was doing it, but it felt so good to hold Sora again. He smelled like sea water and vanilla, the tense line of his body warm and inviting, comforting and familiar. When Sora pulled out of the hug just long enough to turn and throw his arms around Riku’s waist, that felt even better. Riku let himself press his nose against Sora’s hair and breath him in, let himself hug Sora a little too long and a little too hard for friendship, let himself stroke a hand up and down Sora’s back like he’d used to do to soothe him after a bad dream.

And then he forced himself to let go.

“Sorry,” he said. “Just – I really missed you.”

“It’s okay.” Sora looked like he wanted to say something else, but then he just shook his head and opened the door. “I'll see you around.”

The house was so big and silent with Sora gone.

Riku heard the buzz of his phone from somewhere in the kitchen and double checked to make sure he’d locked the door before he returned to his dinner. His phone was on the counter next to the mixing bowl of soy sauce, and he picked it up to see he had a new message from Sora. A smile crossed his face, helplessly fond.

_[Sora] I really missed you, too._

“What’s that face for?” Leon asked over dinner, a bemused expression on his own.

Cloud had made some sort of beef stew, and Sora had sucked down half of it in a haze. He couldn’t stop replaying the conversation with Riku, reliving the hug again and again, and it was more than enough to drown out the rest of the day’s stress. So what if he and Roxas weren’t going to be friends after all? So what if Riku’s house looked like Sora had never lived there? So what if Sora had to find a way to get over the love of his life?

Riku had missed him. Riku had hugged him. Riku wanted to repair their friendship. It was so much more than he’d let himself hope for.

He beamed over at his father. “Just thinking about the future, I guess. It seems pretty bright right now.”

Cloud chuckled. “What a difference a draft makes.”

“No, this is more than just the draft,” Leon said. “He hasn’t been this happy since he moved back in. This is about Riku.”

Sora blushed and stuffed another bite of stew in his mouth as both his dads turned to look at him. He avoided their eyes, because they both knew him too well not to see everything he was hiding with just a glance. Even then, he knew they were probably drawing their own conclusions. And their conclusions were probably wrong.

“We just talked, that’s all,” Sora finally admitted. “We’re going to try and be friends again. And.” He swirled his stew around in the bowl, drawing on a well of courage to say the words. “I was thinking maybe I should use my first paycheck to buy my own apartment.”

Leon and Cloud exchanged glances.

“You know we love having you back here, right?” Leon was the first to say. “You can keep the attic bedroom as long as you want.”

“I know. Yuna and I have been talking through my tendency to put my entire life on hold when one part of it isn’t working out the way I wanted it to, and it feels like I’ve been doing that again. I think part of me thought Riku and I would talk and we’d get back together and I’d move back in with him, so what was the point in looking for my own place? But it’s time for me to move on and move out.”

“Well, that’s… very mature of you, Sora,” Cloud said carefully. “You’re sure this is what you want?”

The fact that Sora was being praised for being mature when he was twenty-five years old was part of the ongoing issues he was working out with Dr. Yuna Aoki, but he decided to let that slide. After all, he was the one who had been sulking in his fathers’ attic bedroom for three years after sulking in his ex-boyfriend’s house for six months.

“I’m sure,” he said. “So if you guys have any leads on places, let me know?”

“Of course.” Leon reached across the table to squeeze Sora’s shoulder. “I’m proud of you, kid.”

The rest of dinner passed uneventfully, and Sora soon made his way back to his room with a lingering smile on his face. There had once been a time when he’d imagined that he and Riku would grow old together like Leon and Cloud, get married, have children, and be gross as all hell. And maybe they would, but he had to stop expecting it. Riku and Roxas might be in love. Sora might fall in love with someone else. He and Riku might never find their way back to each other. And that was all right. That was life.

He couldn’t spin his wheels waiting for something that no longer felt inevitable.

Sora grabbed his Gummiphone from off the nightstand and flicked through it until he got to the photo he had assigned to Riku. He wanted to change it, but, thanks to one drunken night of crying to breakup songs, he didn’t have any remaining pictures of Riku to replace it with.

Unless…

With a sharp breath, Sora opened the Kingstagram app and typed in roxrocks_. Roxas Caraway’s page loaded, full of artistic shots of landscapes and people, objects and street art. The most recent two images were of Riku. One was of Riku emerging from the water in the pool last week, droplets glittering around his damp body, his eyes closed and his skin glowing in the filter. The caption merely read “♥”.

The second was from two days ago. Riku sat on the other side of an ivory table, a fruit smoothie in front of him, one hand lifted to cover half of his face. The visible half was mid-laughter, probably at something that Roxas had said, and he looked so _happy_. Sora’s chest tightened even as he acknowledged that it was a great shot – a sentiment echoed by the many, many comments. Roxas had captioned the photo “lol”.

Before he could think better of it, Sora saved the photo, first to his phone and then to Riku’s contact. He’d replace it when he got to take a photo of his own, he promised himself. For now, it served as a good reminder that he wasn’t the one Riku would be giving fond smiles to anymore. For now, it served as a good reminder that Sora needed to move on.

One step at a time, one day at a time, he _would_ move on. It was for the best.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Except JK, no one's moving on from anyone. The next chapter will be posted next Sunday. Hope you enjoyed!


	4. I Need More Affection Than You Know

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> People actually play blitzball(!). No one kisses anyone, but everyone wants to kiss someone. And Riku makes a major decision that might get him killed.

It began with an Acid Orgy.

That was the name of the new drink they were advertising at Elixir, a combo “so good it was like having an orgy while on acid.” Axel was so delighted by the concept that he had not only ordered one for himself, but then ordered shots of it, and he and Xion were matching each other shot for shot. Luckily, Xion lived within walking distance of the bar, so no one particularly needed to be sober tonight. But Roxas wasn’t interested in getting that drunk. Not in this bar, anyway.

It wasn’t that he’d heard horror stories about blitzball players praying on drunken bar goers or anything. As far as he knew, Elixir had a strict policy about caring for drunk patrons which involved not letting a sloppy drunk go home with anyone they didn’t arrive with. But Roxas had a hard time trusting in general, let alone trusting himself to make good decisions, and that meant the only time he ever really got drunk was when he and Axel worked their way through a six pack while watching reality shows.

Then the bartender set a ginger ale down in front of him.

Roxas frowned. “I didn’t order this.”

“You’ve got an admirer,” the burly man said, pointing across the crowded bar. Roxas craned his head until he locked eyes with an attractive silver-haired man who was giving him an inviting sort of smile.

He reached up to slap Axel on the shoulder for attention. “Hey. Who’s that guy?”

“Who?” Axel squinted in the direction that Roxas was pointing and then his face lit up. “Oh! Come on, Rox, that’s Riku. Riku Estheim? He’s been on the team for like three years, you know him.”

But Roxas was already walking away, elbowing through the crowd until he made it to Riku Estheim’s side with the ginger ale in hand. He set it on the bar by Riku’s clear drink and frowned at him instead. “I didn’t order this.”

“I know. I bought it for you,” said Riku Estheim. “Is that not how people flirt in clubs anymore?”

“That’s how creeps flirt in clubs.”

“Well, I’m not a creep.”

“Things a creep would say.”

Instead of being put off by Roxas’ attitude like so many fuckboys before him, Riku Estheim seemed more amused than anything. “Give it back then if you don’t want it.”

“I _don’t_ ,” Roxas said suspiciously.

“Okay.”

Riku’s easy smile didn’t so much as slip. Roxas glared at him, shoved the ginger ale closer to Riku’s arm, and then headed back toward his friends. He made it two steps before cursing and returning to Riku’s side. “Why are you trying to flirt with me anyway?”

“Well,” Riku mused. “I think the whole gay thing started in kindergarten, when my best male friend and I gave out invitations to the class to attend our wedding at recess…”

Roxas was chuckling before Riku had made it to first grade, let alone to the present day wherein he’d been dragged out of his house by the rest of the Destiny Islands Explorers – sans Axel – because he was “too young to love the inside of his house this much.” It was annoying, how effortlessly charming Riku was. He wasn’t even trying to be, Roxas could tell. There was something aloof, something unapproachable, something distant about him, but his eyes were warm and his smile was sinful.

Hot, charismatic, and emotionally unavailable? Roxas knew before Riku did that they were going home together. It was just a matter of when.

That turned out to be shortly after midnight. Axel and Xion were holding each other up as they approached him. “Naminé is going to kill me,” Xion was whining. Actually what she said sounded more like “Nah-mee-may ish gun kill ee,” but Roxas was very good at translating by now.

“Ready to go, Rox?” Axel asked, swaying only slightly. “Hey, Riku.”

“Hey,” Riku greeted just as Roxas pointed at him and said, “Actually, I’m going to fuck him tonight, so I’ll see you guys tomorrow.”

Despite the pulsing beat of the club, the silence that followed Roxas’ words managed to assert itself. Axel was squinting at him. Xion had started laughing. And Riku looked like a computer buffering.

“Wait,” Riku finally said. “ _Really_?”

“Only if you want to,” Roxas replied. “Consent is important.”

Riku blinked, and then a slow smile began to spread. “I’ve never done this before. But – I’m not opposed?”

“Well, as long as you’re ‘not opposed’,” Roxas mocked. “You’re not going to get all clingy after are you?”

“I mean, I thought we could be friends? We know a lot of the same people…”

“No reason we can’t be sexy friends. But great, cool, we’re on the same page.” Roxas turned back to the friends he’d arrived with. “So, you guys head back to Xion’s, and I’ll meet you there tomorrow. If I’m not back by noon, this man murdered me, and I expect you to avenge my death.”

Riku snorted from behind him, but Axel and Xion gave him a thumbs up, which was good enough. As they stumbled off, Roxas turned to grin up at Riku, reaching out to tuck a lock of silver hair behind Riku’s ear.

“I’m ready to go,” he said, delighting in the way Riku’s pupils visibly dilated. “And, apparently, so are you.”

Riku loved the first game of the season. The time before the match was full of potential, that hum of anticipation, that optimism of a great season ahead, that pride of the hard work that had gotten your team here. He loved it, but he was aware that it stressed other players out. The locker room was evidence of that.

The more nervous Tidus got, the more he tended to posture. He was doing squats next to Wakka, who was sitting on the bench and kicking a blitzball back and forth between his legs. Aqua and Terra were sitting off to the side, their heads bent together, murmuring something to one another. Hayner and Seifer were burning off their energy by arguing about what appeared to be an episode of some TV show they both watched. Axel was talking to Coach Auron Braska, his arms folded, his body still in contrast to his usual perpetual motion.

And then there was Sora, sitting in the midst of it all with his head between his knees like he was trying not to throw up.

In the spirit of their newfound friendship, Riku sat down next to him. Sora didn’t move, though he must have known that Riku was there. He didn’t move even when Riku placed a comforting hand on his back. And he still didn’t move even when Riku offered to get him a bucket or something.

“I’m fine,” he said, voice muffled. “Just a little overwhelmed.”

Riku gingerly patted Sora’s back. In the weeks since their conversation, they’d both taken small steps toward renewing their friendship. They texted every day now, even if it was just something as simple as a stupid meme. They’d shared their player codes in the Gummiphone's arcade app and played each other at Barnyard Battle, Giantland, and Fishin’ Frenzy. Riku had even been sending Sora tips about open apartments around the city.

They weren’t right back where they’d started, but they weren’t in trouble either. So Riku felt confident in his ability say, “It’ll be just like old times. You and me, playing together, taking everybody out. Just think about that.”

Sora made a sound almost like a laugh. “Tidus and Wakka are on our team this time.”

“If it makes you feel better to knock them out during halftime, I’m not going to stop you.”

This time, the laugh was more obvious. Sora sat up, allowing Riku’s hand to fall off his back, and grinned at him. “Dork.”

“Look who’s talking,” Riku grinned back.

When Riku had told Roxas about his talk with Sora and their subsequent attempts to repair their friendship, Roxas had laughed. “You are going to fuck that man before the end of the month, and it’s hilarious that you think you won’t.”

“I won’t,” Riku had insisted with red cheeks, because the last thing he’d needed between practices was to be thinking about Sora naked.

“Okay,” Roxas had drawled in a clearly placating sort of way.

A frown had crossed Riku’s face. “I really won’t. Look, I know this relationship isn’t real, but it’s important to me that you know that I would never disrespect you or humiliate you by cheating on you with someone else. Even Sora. You’re doing me a huge favor here, and I respect that and you.”

“Ugh, shut _up_ ,” Roxas had groaned. “You’re taking all the fun out of this.”

“I'm serious.”

“I know you are. That's what makes you so annoying. Always such a fucking martyr.” Roxas had reached up, flicking Riku's forehead with two fingers. “Dumbass, that's the love of your life. Stop trying to deny the inevitable when you have an exit clause out of this not-relationship, too. And stop ruining my fun.” Roxas had flicked him again and then wandered away. “I’m going to go practice looking cute while crying. I’m thinking for our breakup I should burst into tears, maybe slap you and accuse you of taking the best years of my life before starting this affair, yadda yadda yadda…”

But Roxas was an asshole, so that was nothing new. Being friends was working for Riku and Sora. Slowly but surely, the media was losing interest in Riku’s personal life for its complete lack of drama. And now it was the start of the season, and on the other side of the stadium the Radiant Garden Samurais waited to get their asses kicked. Riku couldn’t remember the last time he’d been in a mood this good.

Auron whistled to get everyone’s attention, and Riku surged to his feet next to Sora to join the rest of the team. Axel beamed at them like a proud father, even though he was only a couple of years older than Riku.

“I’ve seen way more of your ugly mugs than I needed to in general, let alone in the past month, but we’re finally here. Ready to start another kickass season, with a new kickass player.” He winked at Sora, pausing for a smatter of applause that made Sora stand up a little straighter and smile a little wider. “Anyway, I’m not one for long speeches—”

“Since _when_?” Aqua asked with her hands on her hips.

“ _So let me just say_ ,” Axel continued without pause, “that no matter how we do this season, I’m so fucking proud of all of you. Now let’s get out there and make the Samurai wish they’d never left Radiant Garden!”

Riku joined the team in cheering and backslapping and chanting, letting the group energy build until he felt like a god. And having Sora there, mere feet away, cheering and chanting with him the way he should have been all along, felt revolutionary and right at the same time. As they filed out of the locker room and toward the water-filled sphere at the center of the stadium, Riku realized he was smiling at the back of Sora’s head and tried to stamp down on that ever-present well of affection.

They had an opening game to win.

The second he was in the water, every fear Sora had disappeared. There was only himself and his teammates, the water and the ball, the other team and the scoreboard. The distant roaring of the crowd sank through him like a heartbeat.

Game on.

Sora, Riku, and Wakka were the fielders. They spread out on all sides of Axel as he and Samurai captain Irvine Kinneas made their calls for the coin flip. The ball went to the Explorers, so Axel threw it to Wakka and swam back in line with the other defenders. Wakka grinned, and, as soon as the bell rang, he threw the blitzball straight toward the Samurai’s line of defenders.

Before fielder Tifa Lockhart could make contact with what looked like an easy pass, Sora was there. He’d dived down and under her, throwing his hands around Tifa to catch the ball. Another second, and he’d pitched it to the right, into Riku’s waiting arms. Riku moved like a fish through the water, winding around speeding bodies until he was trapped mere feet from the goal. But Sora was there to catch his pass and shoot it backward over his shoulder.

1-0.

It was like they’d never left the island. Riku and Sora didn’t even need to look at each other as they flowed seamlessly into half-remembered plays, reading each other’s minds, reading each other’s bodies. If Aqua queued up a shot to Riku, Sora was there to back him up. If Axel threw the ball overhand to Sora, Riku was there for support.

The Samurai seemed to get the message early on that Riku and Sora had to be guarded simultaneously, because to lose sight of one was to be duped by the other. But even that realization didn’t help them stop the unstoppable force of Riku and Sora on the same team.

2-0.

3-0.

4-0.

5-0.

6-0.

Game point.

The Samurai had the ball, and they were rattled as hell. Sora could see it in the tense line of their shoulders, in their darting eyes. Losing the opening match of the game was understandably embarrassing, but without making a single goal? Even _he_ wanted them to score before the match was over; after all, he knew something of how that felt.

But then Riku caught his eye and nodded. Sora nodded back, burying a smile before it could form.

All three fielders – Tifa Lockhart, Sephiroth Zenero, and Zack Fair – shot toward them at once, so quick it was hard to tell which one of them had the ball. Two defenders went after one, another two after another, and the final defender, Hayner, tailed Zack like he’d stolen money from him. Sora swam upward, high enough to see both teams spread out across the sphere like acquatic ants.

Someone cursed. Tifa had had the ball – and now she didn’t. Because Riku was winding up and throwing it as hard as he could into the air. Up, and up, and up, until it flew right past Sora and out of the water entirely.

Sora swam after it.

He burst out of the sphere to thunderous applause, twisting his body in the air in a move he could do in his sleep, and punching the ball just when it was starting to come back down.

It zipped back into the water, submerging seconds before Sora did, and kept going at a speed that made it dangerous to stop. Sora joined Riku and Wakka in swimming after it in case they needed to do more, but…

Defender Demyx Teioh flinched out of the way and…

Defender Zexion Enkido’s fingers tapped the ball, changing its trajectory to a spin that…

…zipped right over Irvine Kinneas’ shoulder into the goal.

A siren announced the end of the game. The Explorers had won.

Sora’s entire world seemed to hold still for the span of a breath, his eyes wide, bubbles trailing from his open mouth. And then a body slammed into him, jolting him out of his shock. _They’d won!_

“We won!” Riku shouted as the stadium drained of the water.

They floated down together, Riku’s arm around his waist soon joined by Axel’s and then Wakka’s and then Tidus’. By the time they landed on the floor, damp and screaming, Sora was at the bottom of a pile made up of most of the team. Seifer was still leaning against their goal, rolling his eyes in a way that Sora couldn’t help but think was fond.

“Holy shit, you guys,” Axel laughed. “I should’ve gotten the pair of you on this team _years_ ago.”

“Damn right,” Riku said before Sora could, a self-satisfied smirk on his face.

“We all played great,” Sora added with a smile of his own. “I think the month of practice paid off. It was like we’d been playing together for years!”

Riku’s arm was around his back now; Sora could feel the warm press of it on his neck. He wondered if it was weird that he knew without looking which arm was Riku’s. He wondered if Riku knew that he hadn’t let go.

“All right, all right.” Axel was the first to get to his feet, though his smile hadn’t faded one bit. “Let’s go shake hands and be gracious, you victorious idiots. Then interviews, then showers, then alcohol.”

“Free alcohol?” Hayner asked hopefully.

Axel smirked. “Coach Braska’s treat.”

Kairi clung to Riku’s side through his interviews, eyeing the journalists with her most standoffish frown.

“Riku! That was an amazing match. Have you and Sora Leonhart played together before?”

“Yeah, we grew up together with Tidus and Wakka.”

“Riku! Did your pre-existing relationship with Sora have anything to do with his sudden recruitment?”

“If that were true, Sora would have been recruited long ago. He earned his spot on the team like everyone else.”

“Riku! How will you and your boyfriend be celebrating your win?”

“That’s private. Next question?”

Kairi had been expecting so much more that she was almost disappointed. It was the first time that journalists were getting to talk to Riku since she’d distributed his statement about dating Roxas, and they all wanted to talk about Sora. The longer the questions went on, the more Kairi began to relax. And when Riku finally said he had to get going and jogged off toward the locker room with the rest of the team, she let the last of the tension bleed out of her body.

That wasn’t so bad. Maybe her plan was working after all. Maybe Riku and Roxas wouldn’t have to keep this up much longer.

 _And then what?_ her mind sneered. Kairi shook the thought away. And then nothing. And then she carried on with her life and her career. And then this became just another funny work story.

Figuring Riku would be all right for the rest of the night, she pulled out her phone to text him that she was heading home and made her way toward the exit. The girls’ group chat – charmingly named Bad Bitch Sitch by Selphie – was lighting up with texts, as Selphie was trying to coordinate a movie marathon of Timothée Chalamet’s entire filmography.

 _[Xion] plz no he looks like a bby  
_ _[Selphie] just bc you’re a gold star lesbian doesn’t mean you get to ruin this for the rest of us!!!  
_ _[Naminé] I’m with her. He does look rather young.  
_ _[Selphie] STOP SUCKING UP NAMINÉ SHE’S ALREADY DATING YOU  
_ _[Xion] can we watch chris evans’ entire filmography instead  
_ _[Naminé] Oh, yes, I’m soooo excited to watch you drool over ScarJo all right.  
_ _[Xion] bby u kno its just because she looks like u  
_ _[Selphie] Kairi PLEASE RESPOND AND MAKE THEM STOP_

Kairi snickered.

**[Kairi] Death couldn’t stop them. Also, I’m down for Chris Evans.**

And because she was feeling good and because she couldn’t stop making bad decisions, she pulled up another chat and shot off a text.

 **[Kairi] Any chance you’re still here?  
** _[Roxas] actually, yes if you hurry to the parking lot, you might just catch me_

Kairi frowned at the message, but obediently sped her way through the crowd until she hit the even more crowded parking lot. Flashing headlights and honking horns made an already bad traffic jam seem worse, and the congested sidewalks made it near impossible for her to find one man in all this mess. She took her phone out of her pocket to send another text when a hand closed over her elbow.

“You walk really fucking fast in these heels, _damn_ ,” Roxas said, stepping into view and letting go of her arm. “Didn’t you hear me call your name when you came out?”

“Of course I did,” Kairi said breezily. “I just wanted you to work for it.”

Roxas snorted. “Are you done for the night?”

“Yep. You aren’t going to see Riku?”

Roxas glanced up at the giant screens above the doors that led back into the stadium. They were playing recaps of the game, slowing down to examine each impressive play, many of them with Sora at their center. Kairi’s heart brimmed with pride at how well her friend had played in his game. He’d always been a natural as a kid, and now the whole world would be cheering for him. She hoped again that he would take her up on her offer to represent him. She already knew exactly how and where to market him as a brand, let alone a player.

“Nah,” Roxas said, drawing her attention back to him. “I mean, he’ll probably be pretty busy with Sora.”

It took her a moment to remember what they’d been talking about. And, when she did, the bitter way Roxas said Sora’s name made Kairi pause. “Do you… not like Sora?”

“What’s to like? We met once. Barely.”

“You seem to have found something to hate about him after meeting once barely.”

“I don’t hate him.”

“Okay.”

“I don’t.”

“I heard you.”

Roxas was glaring at her, but something on her face made his expression soften. Before she knew it, he was chuckling. “You’re honestly such a brat, Kairi.”

“Look who’s talking!” But then she was laughing, too. She wasn’t sure if anything about the situation was very funny, but Roxas’ laughs were contagious because of how rare they were. He would snicker every once in a while, but the belly laugh his chuckles had developed into was a gift.

“C’mon,” he said. “I’ll take you home. I drove here.”

“Really? Like an actual car and not a skateboard with an extra helmet?”

Roxas pressed a hand to his heart. “Wow, direct strike. I’m going to need to stop by the hospital for some burn cream on the way.”

Her phone continued to buzz in her pocket, but Kairi ignored it to follow Roxas across the parking lot. True to his word, he led her to a rental car that answered to his key fob. An overflowing laundry bag obscured the backseat, and there were two pairs of discarded sneakers on the ground of the passenger side. Kairi climbed in gingerly and then raised her eyebrows at him.

Roxas started the car. “I’m in the process of moving, okay? Give me a break.”

“Moving? Like in with Axel?”

“Like into an apartment I’m paying rent on.”

Kairi’s eyebrows inched toward her hairline. “That seems… permanent.”

“Yeah, well.” Roxas lifted one shoulder in a shrug, but he didn’t say anything else and he didn’t seem eager to explain himself.

In the time that Kairi had known him, he’d been as transient as a storm, hopping from island to island, from country to country, and most times without even saying goodbye. Roxas had always seemed allergic to putting down roots, and that was important. During the nights when Kairi really couldn’t help herself, when her seeking fingers slid between her legs and she brought herself to climax with his name on her lips, she always reminded herself of that fact like it was a cold shower. She could never have been with someone so unreliable.

Nevermind that he had always reliably been there for _her_.

“That’s great,” she managed, pushing those thoughts away. “I hope that means you’ll be around more often.”

“I hope so too,” was all he said in return.

Kairi pulled out her phone to have something to do with her hands, answering her messages back to back.

 _[Sora] thanks kairi! r u coming to the afterparty?  
_ **[Kairi] Nah, I went home. Have an extra shot for me!  
** _[Sora] haha will do!_ _♥_ _♥_ _still on for lunch tomorrow?  
_ **[Kairi] Definitely! Don’t get photographed doing anything stupid tonight, okay?  
** _[Sora] no promises I CAN’T BE TAMED  
_ _[Sora] jk of course not_

 _[Riku] did you see roxas out there  
_ **[Kairi] Yeah, he’s taking me home.  
** _[Riku] tell him i’m gonna be too exhausted for date #3 so we’ll have to reschedule  
_ **[Kairi] Tell him yourself.  
** _[Riku] okay that was more for you than him  
_ **[Kairi] If you and Sora have sex tonight, I will kill you with my bare hands.  
** _[Riku] noted_

 _[Selphie] meet at kairi’s house in an hour!! dress code: pjs  
_ _[Xion] i’ll bring the margarita mix_  
 _[Naminé] I’ll bring the advil._  
 **[Kairi]** **♥** **♥** **♥** **♥**

Roxas pulled up in front of her house all too soon. Kairi put her phone away and tucked her hair behind her ear to find him watching her.

“What?” she asked, her voice coming out a shade too defensive.

Roxas’s expression was conflicted, as if he wasn’t sure he wanted to say whatever it was he had to say. And, then, finally, “Why do you like Sora so much?”

“… _what_?” Kairi, who hadn’t been expecting that _at all_ , stared at him in bewilderment. “Sora?”

“Yeah, just. Sometimes, the way you talk about him, it’s like the sun shines out of his ass. And having seen his ass, I can confirm he’s not keeping sunshine up there, so I just…” He frowned. Shook his head. “Nevermind, this conversation is stupid. I’ll see you around.”

But Kairi made no move to get out of the car. Her heart was pounding, her body tense with the suspicion that if she let Roxas drive away without saying something then it would change their relationship somehow.

“I, um,” she began. “I don’t know if it’s something I can explain. He was the first friend I ever made after I moved to Destiny Islands. You know I’m from Radiant Garden?” She saw Roxas nod out of the corner of her eye. “After my grandmother died, and I was sent to live with my uncle the then-mayor, my whole world was turned upside down. But Sora was like this… kind, bright person. He made everything seem okay again. And, on days when it really wasn’t, he made it clear he’d be here for me until it was. It was the first time I ever had a friend like that. Someone that kind and loyal and… and genuine. Thanks to him pulling me out of my shell, I was able to make more friends – to make a whole life here. Sometimes, it feels like everything I have is thanks to him, even if he doesn’t see it that way at all. In a lot of ways, he’s my hero. So of course I like him. How could I not, after everything he’s done for me?”

“Oh,” Roxas said after a long while. “I get that. I was kind of the same way. Before I met Axel and Xion, I didn’t really have any friends.”

Kairi shifted in her seat to look at him. It was so rare for Roxas to talk about himself or his past that she didn’t even dare breathe too loud for fear he would stop.

“My parents were,” his lips curved humorlessly, “not the best. They were never home, and when they were home they were – just. They never really wanted kids, but that was just what people did, you know? They had society friends to keep up with, and I was just another thing they owned. But I lived in my own head a lot and had a hard time connecting with people until I met Axel.”

Kairi reached out, laying her hand over his on the steering wheel. His hand was almost twice the size of hers, their pale skin gleaming in the streetlight streaming in from the windshield. He shifted, turning his hand over until they were palm to palm, until his fingers could slide between hers and hold gently. His warmth hummed through her entire body.

“Is that why you and Riku aren’t dating for real?” she asked, like an idiot. “Because you have a hard time connecting with people?”

“Riku and I aren’t dating for real because I don’t want to date Riku,” Roxas answered, his gaze intent on hers. “I’m pretty sure he doesn’t want to date me either. What about you?”

“I don’t want to date Riku,” she whispered.

Roxas smiled, soft and warm and just a tad mischievous. “And Sora?”

“Pretty sure _he_ wants to date Riku.”

“What do _you_ want, Kairi?”

His face was so close to hers. When had that happened? He exhaled those words inches away from lips, which tingled from the feel of his hot breath and from the hotter knowledge that she would barely need to move for them to be kissing. His eyes were intensely blue from this angle, like an ocean wave about to submerge her in something she wasn’t sure she was ready for.

And then something flashed in the corner of her eye.

Kairi jolted away from him, practically flattening herself against the car door, but the damage was done. Spots danced before her eyes as Roxas cursed and got out of the car. “Hey, you! Give me that fucking camera!”

The night wind wafted in through the open door, cooling her skin as Roxas’ footsteps faded into the night. Oh, fuck. Oh, _fuck_. What had she done? What had they almost done?

How could she have been so _stupid_?

 _He’s not yours,_ she told herself furiously, burying her face in her hands. _He’s never been yours. He likes_ Riku _. Why would he like you when there’s Riku?_ Even if his words had given her false hope that maybe – just _maybe_ – he might like her instead, she knew better. And the more she thought about it, the less it made sense for Roxas to claim he didn’t want to date Riku. A boy who’d never known how to connect with people grown into a man who had been _connecting_ with Riku for almost a full year? There was no way that Roxas didn’t have some feelings by now. And Kairi was no one’s second choice.

 _You idiot,_ she thought, tears prickling at the corner of her eyes. She dragged a hand over her eyes, surely smudging her mascara, and got out of the car. Either Roxas would catch that photographer, or Kairi would have to find a way to spin this situation to make it look like he wasn’t cheating on Riku. Whatever happened, there was nothing she could do about it right now.

Besides, she had a movie marathon to prepare for.

It didn’t take long for the entire team to get shitfaced. Riku didn’t join them, if only because Sora was several shots into the night and Riku didn’t dare get drunk with him in public. Down that road led the kind of bad decisions that Kairi would murder him for, and Riku knew better than that.

Except that he couldn’t stop touching Sora.

A clap on the shoulder. An arm thrown around his back. A noogie against his spiky hair. All quick touches, all safe touches, but all _constant_ touches. Sora was radiating joy, his happiness contagious, like a living, breathing thing in the air that they could all get high on. And Riku was so proud of him. He’d always known that Sora was a great player, a natural in the water, but it had been so long since he’d gotten to see it that he’d been unprepared for his own reaction to it. It wasn’t even sexual – although there was a fair amount of that too, and always would be where Sora was concerned – but a strong, profound love for the man wedged into the Elixir booth beside him, smiling like his face wasn’t built for anything else.

“Three cheers for our secret weapon, Sora Leonhart!” Axel shouted, lifting another shot glass full of some neon liquid Riku couldn’t identify. “Hip hip—”

“Oh my god, _stop_ ,” Sora laughed. “We all played well! It wasn’t _just_ me.”

“ _Hip hip_ —”

“Hooray!” Riku cheered, his heart fluttering when Sora’s head whipped around to stare at him wide-eyed. Sora’s cheeks reddened and then he buried his face in his hands and laughed and it was so goddamn cute that Riku wanted to cry. Instead, he nudged Sora with his shoulder. “Just let them do it or you’ll regret it next practice.”

“Okay,” Sora said with a shy smile. “I _did_ play pretty great.”

“You were amazing. You’ve always been amazing.”

“Thank you.” The words were said so quietly that Riku had to lean in closer to hear them. And then he didn’t bother to lean away, because he was happy, and he was with Sora, and they were surrounded by his exuberant team, and they both had their clothes on so surely Kairi couldn’t be mad about this.

More shots continued to arrive, ordered by Axel or Tidus or Hayner or all three. At one point, Riku let Sora, Terra, and Seifer drag him over to the beer pong tables and wiped the floor with the other team so badly that Sora didn’t have to drink a single thing. Aqua and Terra went to dance, and Wakka passed out on Tidus’ shoulder with his mouth wide open – an invitation for Tidus and Hayner to see how many straws they could fit into said mouth before he woke up. Through it all, Sora never left Riku’s side, so maybe it was no real surprise that they ended up being the last two in the booth, Riku’s arm over the back, Sora curled sleepily against him like he might fall asleep in the club.

“I think it’s time for you to go home,” Riku murmured, leaning down so Sora could hear him. If that meant his lips almost brushed Sora’s forehead, well. It was loud in here. “Want me to call you a cab?”

“Mhmm,” Sora said with a kittenish yawn. “God, you smell good.” And then he frowned. “Was that an inside thought or an outside thought?”

“Outside thought,” Riku said, helplessly charmed.

“Nooooooo.” Sora scooted a few inches over, putting some distance between their bodies. “Bad.”

“Yes,” Riku agreed. “Very bad.”

He pulled out his phone to keep his hands from reaching for Sora again, using his app to arrange a taxi for them. Riku had never been at Elixir this late before. The club had a different vibe after midnight: the songs were slower, the lights less pulsing, the crowd less oppressive. The VIP section was cordoned off from the rest of the building by both a golden rope and two security guards. Usually, the Explorers didn’t bother to go up here when they could mingle with everyone else, but it was tradition for the times they won the opening match of the season – and for them to invite the other team.

Most of the Explorers were gone except for Hayner and Seifer, who were over by the pool table having a loud argument that apparently required them to be in each other’s faces. Several of the Samurai still lingered, including Zexion Enkido who was literally reading a book in the booth across the room while Lexaeus Raines nursed a glass of liquor in one massive hand beside him.

Riku was jolted from his scrutiny by something hitting his shoulder. Sora had passed out, his cheek fallen against Riku, his mouth wide open and snoring. Riku had forgotten how Sora could snore like a goddamn motorboat, how he used to starfish across the bed with the blankets caught around his waist like a toga, how he used to drool so much his pillow would be damp in the mornings. The memories came with a trace of sadness attached, not for what he’d lost but for what he hadn’t realized he’d lost. The little things you didn’t even realize you were forgetting about a person you’d stopped seeing every day.

His phone buzzed when the taxi arrived. It was easy to scoop his slumbering ex into his arms and carry him down the stairs, across the room, and outside to deposit in the back of the cab. It was a discreet service used mostly by blitzball players, so there was a divider for privacy that kept the driver from seeing what they were doing. Since he’d already plugged Sora’s address into the app, all Riku had to do was sit back and enjoy the ride.

A feat that was made easier by the way Sora curled into a ball in the backseat, his head resting on Riku’s thigh, his fingers curled against Riku’s pant leg.

He rested one hand on Sora’s back and used the other to swipe open his Gummiphone. There were no new messages. He considered sending a cheeky one to Kairi to report that he and Sora had managed to keep their dicks to themselves, but it was way too late at night – or early in the morning – to risk waking her up. He considered sending Roxas the same message, but if Roxas was up then he was developing his photos and would stab Riku with something sharp for disturbing him.

By the time they reached Sora’s fathers’ house, Riku was dozing, too. He shook himself awake, climbing out of the car and turning to pick Sora up again, only to find Sora sitting up, rubbing one eye.

“Am I dreamin’?” he asked, voice thick with sleep.

Riku smiled. “Nope. Just got you home in one piece. Think you can find your keys and make the stairs?”

Sora groaned, but he climbed out of the cab and began searching his pockets for his house keys. Riku watched him with his hands in his own pockets, his fingers curled into fists. The last time he’d been here, at Leon and Cloud’s house, it had been to help Sora move his things out of his childhood bedroom and into their apartment. Since then, Leon and Cloud had come over several times for dinner, but Riku hadn’t thought of suggesting they eat at their place instead. Looking up at the building now, he wished he had. He could barely remember what the inside of it looked like.

“Aha!” Sora exclaimed, holding his keys over his head like a trophy. He grinned at Riku and wobbled toward the steps. Riku hurried after him, hands out to make sure he didn’t tumble backward. It took Sora five minutes to get the door open, but he didn’t immediately go inside. Instead, he turned, gazing up at Riku with hazy blue eyes. “Today was the best day I’ve had in forever. And I’m… I’m really glad you were there.”

Riku refused to close the scant distance between them, but it almost didn’t matter. Sora’s back was against the partially open door and the top stair was small enough that Riku’s phone probably couldn’t fit comfortably between their bodies. Sora’s eyes reflected the light from the stars above and the streetlights behind them, and Riku couldn’t stop staring into them.

“I’m glad, too,” he murmured. “I always wanted us to do this together. It wasn’t fun without you.”

“I’m here now,” Sora murmured back.

“Yeah.”

“Riku?”

“Yeah?”

Sora’s throat visibly bobbed as he swallowed. “You have a boyfriend. We can’t—”

“I know.” Riku allowed himself to drink in Sora’s face like this one last time, his smooth tan skin, his big blue eyes, his wilting spiky hair, the beautiful drunken flush that spread across his cheeks and down his neck. And then he took a deep breath and climbed backward down two stairs, putting some space between them. “Sorry. I shouldn’t—”

“ _We_ shouldn’t,” Sora said firmly. “Go home, Riku. See you at practice?”

“We can—I mean, it doesn’t just have to be practice, right? We can hang out outside of that. Because we’re friends.”

Sora’s smile was fleeting. “No, we really can’t. I’ll see you at practice.”

And then he was gone, the click of the lock falling into place seeming loud in the vacuum of sound Sora left behind. Riku ran a hand over his face, cursing his own idiocy. Sora was the one who was intoxicated, and yet _he_ was the one acting like he had no control over himself and no respect for his own relationship.

The relationship that Sora didn’t know was fake.

If Riku told him the truth, would that change anything? Or would that just drag Sora into the same emotional hell he was living in, longing for someone he couldn’t be with just because the press had caught a picture of Riku with someone else? But then hadn’t he already dropped Sora into that emotional hell by keeping the truth from him in the first place?

What a mess.

Riku lingered outside until the light went on at the top of the building, as sure a sign as any that Sora had made it to bed. Then he started walking down the street. He needed to figure out how he was going to ask Kairi’s permission to tell Sora the truth without her finally murdering him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The next chapter will be posted next Sunday. Hope you enjoyed!


	5. How The Mighty Fall

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Riku makes a mistake. Roxas and Kairi continue to take up more of this story than I anticipated. Sora makes a friend.

It began at the supermarket.

Whenever Roxas was in Destiny Islands, he spent all of his time freeloading at Axel’s house or, more rarely, at Xion’s house. (Xion had Naminé, and Roxas respected that. Plus, one time Roxas had barged into her room to find Naminé with her tongue in a place that Roxas had never wanted to see, and his eyes were still trying to recover.) In lieu of paying rent, he did all the cleaning and shelled out money to buy their groceries, since they were going through them twice as fast with him around.

On this occasion, he was staying with Axel, and he was annoyed. Not by Axel – never by Axel, despite them having wildly different temperaments – but by the fact that the supermarket had changed its layout since the last time he’d been on the Islands. Where he’d expected to find the cheese, there were now rows and rows of cereals. Where he’d usually grab some fruit, there was now a small bakery. And where he should have been able to choose some yoghurt, he instead found himself staring at far too many different kinds of fruits and vegetables.

“What the fuck,” he muttered, eyeing a pyramid of tomatoes.

“Did they run your puppy over with your car or does that tomato just owe you money?” said a voice from behind him. Roxas turned to see a small, pretty redhead standing there with a shopping basket in one hand. Her eyebrows arched over big, blue eyes. “Or did you hold still long enough that they thought you were gone and finally moved?”

“Tomatoes move when you’re not looking at them?” Roxas asked. “I thought that was just toys.”

“Clearly you were a _Schoolhouse Rock!_ kid and not a _VeggieTales_ kid.”

“What’s _Schoolhouse Rock!_?”

“Wow,” the woman deadpanned.

Roxas chuckled, amused by the exasperated expression on her face, the look that said _I don’t know you, and you’re already the most annoying person I have ever met_. 

“I’m Roxas,” he finally said, digging around his pocket until he found his shopping list. “And do you by any chance know where I can find this stuff?”

“Kairi,” she replied, taking it from him. “And probably. What will you give me for my help?”

“My genuine thanks and the promise that you never have to see me again.”

“Tempting, tempting. I’ll think about it.”

Despite such an introduction, it didn’t take Roxas long to realize that Kairi was a _nice_ woman. Polite. Magnetic. Mischievous in her humor. She helped an old woman grab a can of creamed corn from a bottom shelf and then asked Roxas why his hair looked like a houseplant. They got into a fight by the cheese freezer over which cheeses did and did not belong in a smart person’s top ten list. Even after pointing out where to find the last item on his list, she came with him as if she’d forgotten she had her own shopping to do. And Roxas didn’t even mind. She had a way of talking that made it feel like they’d known each other for years, and Roxas was more than willing to go with it.

He hadn’t had such easy chemistry with someone since the day he’d met Axel.

“Thanks for the help,” Roxas said once they were outside, both carrying more shopping bags than they should reasonably be able to carry. “I guess—”

“I’ve been thinking about it,” Kairi interrupted. “And the gratitude and disappearance definitely aren’t good enough. I have a better idea, though.”

Roxas smiled. “Do you?”

“How about we just do this again?”

“Buy my groceries together?”

“Hang out together, smartass.” Kairi gave him that exasperated look again, but her eyes sparkled with good humor that made her face light up. “Maybe even on purpose. Maybe not even at a gocery store.”

“Not sure how we’re going to manage that,” Roxas said. “Any ideas?”

“You could give me your number. And then I could give you mine. And then we could use each other’s numbers.”

“I mean. If you think that will work.”

Roxas handed over his Gummiphone with no small amount of amusement. As Kairi’s eyes lowered to send herself a text message from his phone, he examined her more closely than he had before. He’d clocked that she was pretty right away, but that fact seemed more striking now that she was clearly flirting with him. He’d never picked someone up in a grocery store before, so he wasn’t sure of the rules. And it had been ages since he’d been on an actual date.

He should warn her that she was making a big mistake.

But then she looked up from the phone in time to catch him watching her and smiled and… shit. Roxas felt his cheeks burn hot for no reason, as if absorbing the heat of that sunshine smile. He cleared his throat, trying to find the words to play it off, when Kairi caught sight of something that caused her expression to shutter.

“Um,” she said in an odd voice. “Riku says to buy more lube if you’re coming over tonight.”

“Oh,” Roxas said. For a moment, he had no idea who the fuck Riku was. “ _Oh_ , no, we’re just—”

“I didn’t know you knew Riku,” Kairi continued, and there was still something off about her voice. She handed him his phone back, a strained smile on her face. “Sorry! He didn’t tell me he was seeing someone.”

“I’m not seeing him,” Roxas corrected. “And – wait, you know him?”

“Ah, yeah, we grew up together…”

 _Shit_. “We’re just. It’s just. Kind of a sex thing?”

“Okay.”

“I really don’t even like him like that.”

“Everyone likes Riku,” Kairi said, with a wry tone that spoke of a deeper issue Roxas knew better than to try to address right now. “If you don’t now, you will soon. Trust me.” 

He pocketed his phone, then ran his fingers through his hair to dispel some of his nervous energy. He couldn’t take that look on her face. It was too familiar. “No, trust _me_. We only met a couple weeks ago and I’ve just—”

Kairi held up both hands, shaking her head furiously behind them. “I don’t want to know any details. I’m not judging you! I just didn’t know you and Riku were, uh. Not dating, or whatever you’re calling it.”

“Sex,” said Roxas. “We’re calling it sex. And it’s nothing. I still want to hang out with you.”

Kairi smiled faintly. “Well, you have my number. I’d better go.”

There were a thousand things he could have said to make her stay, but not a single one of them made it out of his mouth. What did it matter, anyway? If she’d stayed, he would have inevitably disappointed her. Or, worse, he would have gotten attached to her, and feelings were messy, dangerous things. He’d never seen her before today. He’d likely never see her again. It didn’t matter what she thought or what this could have been.

It didn’t matter.

But as he watched her walk away, an unpleasant feeling curling in his stomach, a voice in the back of his head whispered: _Liar_.

“I want to tell Sora the truth.”

Kairi didn’t even stop drinking her earl grey tea, her pinky extended as she brought the cup to her lips. Her fingernails were painted a dusky pink color today. “You want to tell Sora and only Sora the truth about your fake relationship? I can’t imagine why. And, quite frankly, I am so shocked.”

Her monotone made Riku blink. “Are you making fun of me?”

“Yes.”

They were sitting in the living room of her studio apartment, Kairi sitting cross-legged on the loveseat in front of her magazine-laden coffee table while Riku frowned his way through a sandwich at the kitchen island. He hadn’t really tasted it, eating it on autopilot while he tried to find a way to ask Kairi about the situation. In the end, he had just blurted it out inelegantly.

And Kairi, apparently, was making fun of him.

“I can’t lie to him,” Riku said, staring down at his sandwich like it might have finished itself in the time he’d been talking. “Even when we were just friends, I never lied to him. If we’re going to be friends again—” Kairi snorted, “I don’t want to— _what_?”

“Riku, come on.” Kairi set the teacup on the table and leaned back in the loveseat with her arms folded. “If you and Roxas hadn’t been caught kissing and we hadn’t started this whole thing right before Sora walked back into your life, would you and Sora be back together right now?”

Riku opened his mouth to say he didn’t want to assume anything about what Sora wanted and how Sora felt but – couldn’t he? Hadn’t Sora sat in his kitchen and said that he’d been waiting for the right time to call? Hadn’t Sora said that he’d missed Riku as much as Riku had missed him? Riku really didn’t want to assume, but even if Sora had never gone to see Dr. Aoki, if he’d asked Riku if he could move back in tomorrow, Riku would have let him.

“That’s not why I’m doing this,” Riku insisted. “It just feels cruel. Whether we get back together or not, there’s still… we still love each other. And I know how I’d feel if I had to watch him going around with someone new only to find out later it was fake the whole time and he never told me. I don’t have any good reason not to tell him, and this is _hurting_ him. I know it is.”

Kairi sighed, reaching up to rub her temples. “You’re not wrong,” she admitted. “I spent most of our lunch trying to convince him that he wasn’t a homewrecking douche for wanting to kiss you so bad when you have a boyfriend. Stop smiling.”

Riku bit his lower lip to tamp down on it.

Kairi sighed even louder. “Look, I agree that you should tell him. I’m not going to stop you. But that decision doesn’t need to exist in a vacuum.”

“Huh?”

“I think this whole arrangement with Roxas has run its course.” Kairi picked up her teacup again and something about it struck Riku as a diversionary tactic. She wasn’t meeting his eyes as she continued. “I’ve been keeping an eye on the news and the gossip rags. No one’s talking about you two now that the season has started. In fact, more people are talking about you and Sora and how well you work together as a team. Roxas has only made the news once recently, and it was an ad for his art show.”

“Oh.” The idea honestly hadn’t occurred to him, that this could end so quickly. It had only been just over a month and— “Wait, Roxas has an art show coming up?”

Kairi stared at him over the teacup. “Do you guys ever talk or is it all just naked fun times with the two of you?”

“We talk,” Riku said defensively. “Just. It’s Roxas, you know? He’s really private about a lot of stuff.”

Kairi finished the last of her tea and set the empty cup back on the coffee table. Then, she unfolded herself from the loveseat and padded in her bare socks into her bedroom. She returned a few minutes later with a black and white poster that she handed to him before taking a seat on the stool next to him. Across the top, it said SUMMER VACATION: An Exhibition by Roxas Caraway. Under that was a picture of Roxas, wearing his most neutral expression, and under that was a date, time, and location that Riku was seeing for the first time.

“You should go,” Kairi murmured. “I’m sure it would mean a lot to him to have you there. I’m sure it would mean a lot to him that you cared enough to be there.”

“It’s not that I don’t _care_. I just don’t want to push my nose into places I’m not wanted.”

“Some people need the push. Roxas is used to keeping everything to himself. How’s he supposed to know he doesn’t have to if we don’t tell him?”

Riku smoothed out the poster, his eyes catching on Roxas’ professional photo. He was as distant and unknowable in the photo as he was in real life, and Kairi hadn’t said it, but Riku couldn’t help but feel like a shit friend if Roxas didn’t even want to invite him to his art show.

“Thanks, Kairi,” he said, folding the poster and stuffing it into his pocket. “I’ll make sure I tell him.”

She smiled. “Please do.”

The exquisite hell of pratice had become a lot more bearable now that they were friends. Well, now that they were friends _and_ Sora was taking care to get off at least once before he ever got to the pool. Riku still looked like every one of Sora’s wet dreams in his jammers, but the start of the season had taken some of the edge off of Sora’s constant _wanting_.

Which was good, because he and Riku were dancing on the knife’s edge of disaster at all times.

They both arrived early to hang out and do laps before the rest of the team showed up. They stayed so late that the janitor had shooed them out so he could clean more than once. And even with everyone around, Riku was so effusive in his praise of Sora for quickly picking up on their plays that Sora spent all of his time red-faced and pleased. “Friends” was a flimsy word for what they were doing, and Sora alternated between guilty heartbreak and guilty hope with little more than a thought of Riku’s smile to mark the boundary between one emotion and the other.

And then the Explorers played the Twilight Town Dusks.

Sora had already gone into the day knowing it would be a strange one. Instead of the nervous excitement that had preceded their opening match, there was a chilly tension in the air as they prepared to play the Dusks. It was clear that no one had forgiven Yuffie for transferring teams last minute, and they intended to show that in the stadium.

Sora, who had a poster of Yuffie Kisaragi in his room at home, kept his head down and his mouth shut for fear that someone would be able to smell it on him or something. Riku dropped down next to him on the bench, and Sora gave him a look that communicated that if he brought up the poster, then Sora would have no choice but to pinch him in the side.

But instead Riku surprised him by saying: “Hey. Unless you’re really feeling Elixir after this, you mind skipping and coming with me after the game? I need to talk to you.”

“About what?” Sora asked, trying not to seem panicked. The last time Riku had started a conversation with those words… well.

Riku seemed to pick up on it anyway, seeing through Sora as easily as he always had. “Oh, no, not that kind of talk. Well, I mean I hope it’s not. I just have to tell you something, and I want us to have time to actually talk about it. That’s all.”

Sora didn’t realize how tense he was until Riku’s hand touched his shoulder and all the anxiety bled out of him in an instant.

“Trust me,” Riku said. “I’m hoping this conversation will make things better, not worse.”

 _That’s cheating,_ Sora wanted to say. He trusted Riku more than he trusted himself sometimes. But that, like many of his thoughts, was too heavy for just friends. So instead he smiled and folded his hands in his lap so one wouldn’t reach up to cover Riku’s in turn.

Even as distracted as Sora was, the Explorers still won the game, 7-4. Riku easily compensated for the fact that Sora’s mind was elsewhere, taking the lead on their plays, setting him up for the easiest shots, giving him an unnecessary but still adorable pep talk during halftime. Sora remembered when they’d been growing up together, when his feelings for Riku had changed and he’d found it near impossible to believe that Riku might feel the same way about him. And this, he realized as they played together, was why: he had no idea where the line was between Riku acting like his best friend and Riku acting like his boyfriend. Nothing had changed when they’d started dating except for the addition of kissing and sex into the mix.

Nothing had changed now, except for how everything had changed. Where was the line?

Sora swerved the crowd of reporters calling his name from in front of the stands and jogged into the locker room to shower and change. Without blitzball to distract him, his anxiety about this talk with Riku had come flooding back, making it feel like a line of ants were crawling over his skin. No matter how he tried to tell himself that there was nothing worse that Riku could tell him than “I think we should break up,” his pulse raced anyway.

He rushed his way through a shower and lingered fully dressed by the door while the rest of the team filed in, Riku among them. Several of his teammates drifted over to congratulate him on his gameplay, and Sora let himself be swept into those conversations. He was determined to get Seifer to crack a smile at him at least once, and just because he hadn’t succeeded so far didn’t mean it was impossible.

“—and then he said, ‘Well, I’m not going to spread it!’” Sora finished with a flourish. Seifer stared blankly at him. “Oh, come on. This is quality humor! Should I explain it? It’s not as funny if I have to explain it…”

“Please take him,” Seifer said. “I’ll literally pay you to get this lamer away from me.”

Sora turned to see Riku standing there, his eyes alight with amusement. “ _I_ thought it was funny. Ready to go?”

Sora did them both the favor of nodding instead of melting into a little puddle of goo at his feet.

He expected Riku to have called them a car, or to hail one of the numerous cabs lined up outside the front of the stadium. Instead, Riku led him down two blocks until they reached a nearby playground — a familiar one at that. The four of them – Tidus, Wakka, Sora, and Riku – had often climbed to the top of the jungle gym in the heart of the park and watched the giant screens outside the stadium through a pair of binoculars they passed between them. They couldn’t afford to attend all the games, and their parents lit into them if they found out they’d tried to sneak in, but the jungle gym was free and the binoculars had been cheap once they’d pooled their allowances enough times.

Sora ran a fond hand over the bars of the jungle gym as he followed Riku over to the swingset. Riku sat in one swing facing the stadium, so Sora sat in the swing next to him facing the other way. Though anxiety still bubbled under his skin, the darkness of the park, the coolness of the breeze, and the faint sound of the waves from the nearby ocean all combined to wrap Sora in a blanket of peace.

“I don’t know how to ease into this conversation,” Riku said, his voice barely above a whisper. It was like he was caught in the same nighttime spell as Sora and was loathe to break it even with his voice. “I’m really sorry I didn’t tell you sooner. It just never seemed like the right time.”

Sora lightly pushed himself back and forth with his toes, staying quiet. Waiting.

“Roxas and I…” Riku blew out a sharp breath. “Roxas and I aren’t really dating. We never have been.”

Sora skidded to a stop. He stared at Riku as Riku unloaded the whole story, from meeting Roxas in Elixir a year ago to asking Kairi’s permission to make Sora the first and only person Riku had told. The words seem to pass right through him, numbing his anxiety but also numbing his ability to feel anything at all. Riku and Roxas weren’t really dating. Riku was single. This whole time. It had been fake this whole time.

Images flew in front of Sora’s eyes. Seeing Riku again. Watching Riku and Roxas kiss. Beating himself up over a guilty shower fantasy. Being confronted by Roxas in the hallway. Trying to keep his hands and his lips to himself. The guilt. The shame. The heartbreak.

He stood, his ears ringing too loudly for him to know whether or not Riku was still talking.

“Sora?” he heard as if from a distance.

Sora started walking. Blind to where he was going, he walked, trying to put as much distance between himself and this situation as possible. And then he jolted backward, whirling around to see that Riku had grabbed his arm to keep him from moving any further.

Riku’s eyebrows were furrowed. “Sora, where are you going?”

“Get off me.”

“Sora—”

“Get _off_ me!” Sora yanked his arm out of Riku’s grip and stumbled back, putting a few feet between them. So he could think. So he could breathe. “Just – I have to go. I can’t—”

Riku’s expression cracked down the middle, and fuck if that didn’t make Sora’s heart crack down the middle, too. He had no idea how every beat of his stupid heart could be this painful and yet still have the time to ache for someone else, too.

“Sora,” Riku said miserably. “Please. I wanted to tell you. I wanted—Could you just talk to me?”

“I feel like an idiot.” Tears stung Sora’s eyes. He tipped his head back, gazing at the moon to avoid letting them fall. “This whole time, I’ve felt like shit, Riku. Like the worst kind of person. Because I love you so much. And I want you so bad. In every way. You’re—I’m pretty sure you’re the love of my life.”

“You’re mine, too—”

“No, but – but you had moved on. You had Roxas. I felt like an idiot for thinking you’d wait for me. And like an asshole for not being able to control myself around you. And like shit for giving Roxas every justifiable reason to hate me and for letting you go in the first place and for every time I – and it was all _fake_? You let me feel like this for _no reason_? Don’t act like you didn’t know—!”

“We weren’t supposed to tell _anyone_. And I didn’t think—I didn’t _think_. I’m sorry.”

Sora laughed, but there was no humor in it. He looked at Riku again, his pale, perfect face bisected by the shadowed bars of the jungle gym. The same pale, perfect face he’d watched Roxas kiss again and again. The same pale, perfect face he’d longed for and hated himself for longing for.

The pale, perfect face he’d wasted his tears on for over a month.

Sora turned and walked away. This time, Riku didn’t stop him.

The day of Roxas’ art show dawned like a soothing balm for an incredibly rough week. Kairi checked her phone as she walked into Central Island Gallery, but Sora still hadn’t responded to any of her thirteen text messages or her seven phone calls. He’d completely dropped off the grid outside of practice, during which, Riku said, he refused to make eye contact and outright walked away if Riku tried to approach him.

Kairi had deeply miscalculated how badly her scheme would affect Sora, and her confidence was really taking a dive as a result. She’d had three different publicists at the firm read over her statement declaring that Riku and Roxas had broken up amicably, because she couldn’t trust herself with even that much anymore.

But today wasn’t about her. She slipped her phone back into her pocket and found her brightest smile, unwilling to ruin Roxas’ big day with her friendship drama. He’d gotten an entire room to himself for the exhibition, and she could hear a crowd of people talking over one another as she entered. The room was packed, mainly with reporters. She eyed their notepads, tape recorders, and cameras as she swept by to look at the actual photographs.

The Summer Vacation exhibit seemed to be an examination of summer and vacation across countries. One photo showed the sunlight bending through the crystal clear water that surrounded Destiny Islands. Another photo showed a group of children from the back, buying the sea-salt ice cream for which Twilight Town was famous. Yet another photo showed nothing but a broad smile that Kairi recognized as hers, though she didn’t remember when Roxas might have taken the picture. It was placed next to a photo of the sky on a sunny day, and something about the filter he’d put over both photos made her smile seem to eclipse the sun itself.

“Hey, you made it.”

Kairi smiled as Roxas came up alongside her. “This is all _amazing_. Did you have to work me into this, though?”

“Yes,” he said simply. “If you didn’t want me to, you shouldn’t have signed the release form.”

Kairi’s smile widened. “Show me the rest.”

Roxas held out an arm and she took it, allowing him to lead her around the room. He quietly let her take in the photos and only explained why he’d taken this one or displayed that one with that one if she asked. Otherwise, he seemed happy for her to interpret it however she wanted. He walked like a man in no hurry to get to the end of the night, and Kairi found herself glad she’d whipped out a low-cut gown for the occasion.

By the time they made it back to the photo of her smile, Roxas was the one lighting up the room. “And then Axel was like ‘Summer Vacation? When you could have called it Axel? Missed opportunity.’” He shook his head. “And yet he still got here before everybody else.”

“It’s cute how close you guys are.” Kairi waited until Roxas was looking down at her to continue. “And you should be really proud of yourself. For all of this. And for how talented you are. I’m glad so many people get to see that today.”

Roxas ducked his head. “Whatever.”

“Oh my god,” said Kairi, delighted. “Are you _blushing_?”

“Shut u—is that Riku?”

The shock in his voice drew her attention to the door, where Riku was indeed walking into the room. He was wearing black pants and a black tie over a white button down, looking more like a model than any human being had any right to. Almost immediately, every camera in the room was pointed at him, flashes going off so quickly that Kairi was nearly blinded.

“I knew they weren’t here for me. They just want some drama,” Roxas muttered, his eyes still wide as they watched Riku cross toward them. “What is he doing here?”

“I invited him,” Kairi admitted. “He didn’t know about your show, and when I mentioned it, he wanted to come.”

“He did?”

“Why do you sound so shocked? He’s your friend, isn’t he?”

“I mean, yeah, but,” Roxas blinked down at her. “We’re not that kind of friends.”

“Why not?”

Roxas didn’t seem to know how to answer that question. And, anyway, he wouldn’t have had the chance to, because there Riku was, looking as uncomfortable as he always did under the attention that his fame brought him. He nodded at her in greeting before focusing his attention on Roxas.

“Hey,” he said. “I hope it’s okay for me to be here. I can leave if you want, but this is incredible and I wanted to at least come and say congratulations.”

Riku stretched out a hand. Something about the bewildered way that Roxas looked from it to Riku’s face, as if he couldn’t quite wrap his mind around the fact that Riku was here of his own free will, made Kairi profoundly sad. It was an expression she knew well, the face of someone who had been overlooked so many times that he’d come to expect it.

Sometimes, it scared her how alike she and Roxas were.

She nudged him with her elbow, which seemed to jolt him into action. He shook Riku’s hand with a small, pleased smile. “Thank you. I didn’t think this was really your scene.”

“It’s not. But it’s you.” The simple, easy way he said it, as if that made all the difference, made Roxas’ smile widen.

Kairi was shocked by how hard it was to watch that smile be directed at someone else, after everything, even though she should have seen it coming. Everyone liked Riku. _Everyone_. Why would anyone want her when they could have Riku?

She slipped her arm out of Roxas’ and began to back into the crowd to give the two of them some time alone, but she hadn’t even taken two steps before Roxas’ arm slid around her waist. He tucked her close against his body as he and Riku talked, a conversation that Kairi wasn’t following at all because her entire body was on fire everywhere Roxas was touching her. Waiters were circulating with trays of champagne and Kairi wanted to snag one, if only to have an excuse for the flush in her cheeks.

She had no idea why her body couldn’t seem to understand that Roxas wasn’t hers to have. She had no idea why he kept giving her false hope.

“—leaving?”

Kairi blinked out of her thoughts to find that Riku was gone. Roxas’ grip on her waist had loosened, and he was peering down at her with fond blue eyes.

“Um,” she said. “What?”

“I asked if you were leaving,” Roxas repeated, and his voice was as fond as his expression. “I was hoping you’d stay until the end, but if you have to leave, then I’ll understand.”

“What, um. What happens at the end?”

“Nothing. I just…” Roxas faltered for a moment before seeming to gather his courage. “I just want to share this whole night with you. If – If that’s okay.”

“Well, fuck,” said Kairi.

Roxas laughed. “I’ll take that as a yes.”

He let her go and held out a hand. _We should talk about this,_ she wanted to say. _There are cameras in here. I can’t be Riku for you._

_I like you so much._

Kairi slid her hand into his and let him take her wherever he wanted to go.

There were a million other places that Roxas would rather have been, but he wouldn’t feel right about being in any of them until he tried. Kairi waited across the street in the car for encouragment, and Roxas was feeling pretty good. Optimistic, even, and that was new for him. He wanted to share the wealth.

He rang the doorbell and waited. Luckily, he didn’t have to wait long.

A middle-aged man with the same chocolate brown hair as Sora’s and crow’s feet by his grey eyes stared down at him. He was wearing a pair of blue plaid pajama bottoms and nothing else. “Uh. Can I help you?”

“Is Sora here?” Roxas asked politely. “I know it’s late, but I really need to talk to him.”

The man scratched at the light stubble that coated his chin, grey hairs mixed in with the brown. “Well, technically you’re not on the list of people he said not to let in under any circumstances. It was implied, but it wasn’t said. So I guess you can come in, as long as you’re aware you’ll leave out a window if you upset him anymore than he already is.”

“I understand, sir.”

“Leon works fine,” said the man. “Come on, then.”

 _Leon Leonhart?_ Roxas snorted mentally, but didn’t dare say.

He followed Leon up the stairs of a relatively neat two-story house, the kind of house his mother would call “quaint.” It struck Roxas as cozy instead, lived and loved in. There were even family photos lining the walls, photos of Sora across various ages, with and without Leon, and some including another, blond man whose hair spiked even more ridiculously than Sora’s did. Some of the pictures, Roxas noted, even had Riku in them, and those were the funniest ones. It looked like Riku had just gotten taller and broader, but otherwise hadn’t changed at all.

Sora’s room was apparently in the attic. Leon knocked on the ceiling and then pulled down the stairs and waved Roxas up them. He didn’t hang around after that, heading back down to wherever his room was. Roxas waited until his footsteps faded before following Sora’s curious call into the attic.

The room looked exactly like what he would expect it to look like, given what he knew of Sora’s personality. Some things were boxed up, but the walls were painted ocean blue and clothes and old toys littered the ground. A line of sneakers cluttered the space beneath the window, and two lamps shaped like flowers dangled from the ceiling. Sora was lying on top of his bed, hugging a paopu fruit pillow to his chest, but he sat up when he saw Roxas.

He looked surprise for all of a second before a resigned expression took over his face. “It was Leon who let you in, wasn’t it? He’s such a busybody.”

“I’ll try not to take up too much of your time,” Roxas said, sinking into Sora’s desk chair. “You probably know what I’m here about.”

Sora rubbed his hand over his face. “It’s not like I’m not trying to get over it. I am. I’m just so _mad_.”

“Look, let me tell you a story that I swear has a point.” He waited until Sora was looking at him before he continued. “Do you want to know the reason I decided to go home with Riku the first night we met? It was because I knew he was in love with you. That’s my whole type. Unavailable people.”

Sora’s eyebrows knit together. “Okay.”

“I had no idea who you were at the time. But you were literally all he talked about. He made a joke that he was hitting on me because he’d known he was gay since you two got married in kindergarten and then he recounted basically every big gay moment of his life and you were part of every single one of them.” Roxas snorted a little as he remembered sitting at the bar in Elixir, listening to Riku talk about Sora without seeming to realize he was talking about Sora, and what it probably said about his self-esteem that this worked as a seduction technique. “I wasn’t looking for a relationship. I just wanted to have sex with someone who wouldn’t get clingy. I didn’t _want_ to like him.”

“But…?” Sora prompted.

“There’s no but. I don’t like him. I mean, not like that, anyway. My actual point is that I knew it would be a waste of time going in. It’s always been about you, with him.”

Sora’s eyes dropped to his comforter. He began to pick at it in silence.

“Actually, I’ve never told him this but, ha, he called me by your name like three times after I went home with him. Not even during sex! It would have made sense if it was during sex. But it was when he made me some tea – just the way you like it, apparently – and when we were falling asleep and then when he kissed me at the door.” Roxas rolled his eyes. “To this day, I haven’t bothered to ask him why he was trying to pick me up in a bar, but it was so clear he wasn’t ready to be sleeping with anyone who wasn’t you.”

“And you slept with him again?” Sora blurted, still not raising his eyes. “ _Why_?”

“I mean, it was good sex. You’ve had sex with him. You _know_.” Roxas sighed at the look Sora shot him, then shrugged. “I don’t know what to tell you. I was always traveling on and off the Islands at the time. I didn’t have time to date. And the one time I met someone I really liked, I fucked it up before it even started. Which was the closest I’ve ever come to being in a relationship ever, actually. Being with Riku was easy. I get off, and I don’t have to feel or lose anything. I wasn’t the one he wanted, and he wasn’t the one I wanted, but we were what we had. That was what I was looking for at the time.”

“That’s really sad, Roxas,” Sora said, and there was that irritating earnestness again. “You deserve to be happy, with someone who wants you and who you want back.”

“This isn’t actually about me right now,” Roxas huffed, wondering how Riku and Sora didn’t exhaust themselves being so noble and sincere all the time. “This is about you and Riku. I know you’re mad, and you have every right. But that man’s been in love with you the entire time I’ve known him and beyond, and I don’t want to be the thing standing between the two of you anymore. I’m sorry I ever tried to be.”

Sora was quiet for another long moment. Then he asked, “Why did you try to be? I mean, if you’ve never had feelings for Riku, why do you hate me so much?”

Well. In for a penny, in for a pound. “Because the girl I like likes you, and I have _no idea_ why everyone likes you so much.”

Sora stared at him. At first, the noise was so quiet that Roxas wasn’t sure he’d heard correctly. But then Sora snorted again and the snorts barreled into snickering which descended into laughter and Roxas was forced to acknowledge that he had been too generous in his estimations of Sora’s saintlike personality.

“Are you laughing at me right now?” he asked. “ _Seriously_?”

Sora laughed harder. He laughed so hard that he hunched over on the bed, clutching his sides, and it wasn’t long before the absurdity of the moment struck Roxas, too. He started to chuckle, which only seemed to set Sora off even _more_.

It seemed like an age passed before they both managed to get control over themselves. Sora wiped tears from his eyes.

“So, let me get this straight. I’ve been jealous of you because you’ve been fake dating and sleeping with my ex—”

“Actually, Riku and I haven’t slept together since you walked back into his life, but continue.”

“And you’ve been hating me because you think some girl you like has a crush on me?”

“Kairi isn’t some girl,” Roxas said. And then smacked his own forehead with a hand. “Forget I said that—”

“It’s _Kairi_?” Sora’s lips twitched like he might laugh again. “Wait, you think Kairi likes _me_?”

“I know she does. You should hear the way she talks about you. And the face she makes—”

“Oh my _god_.”

“I hate everything about this conversation.”

“Me too!” Sora flopped back on his bed, staring up at the ceiling. “I’ve been in a love square, and I didn’t even know it.”

“It’s really been more like a love line,” Roxas offered. “Two perpendicular lines, maybe. Definitely not even enough to be a square, anyway.”

When Sora didn’t say anything, Roxas glanced down at his watch. Kairi had been sitting in the car for a full thirty minutes. He was surprised she hadn’t sent a text or tried to come inside. He was surprised he and Sora had been in the same room for thirty minutes without killing each other.

“I should go,” he said, getting to his feet and straightening the desk chair. “Listen, consider giving Riku a break, okay? No one loves you more than that guy, and it’s obvious you love him, too. Our breakup is official now, and I want you crazy kids to make it work.”

“What about you?” Sora asked, tilting his head enough to look at him. “Are you and Kairi going to make it work?”

Roxas shrugged again. “Who knows? I’m really not good at feelings and shit. She can definitely do better.”

“I mean, I don’t really know the situation. But have you considered that maybe the reason you’re so convinced that she has feelings for me is so you have an excuse not to get too close and a built-in justification for the rejection you’re already anticipating?”

“Wow,” Roxas deadpanned. “I didn’t realize you were my therapist.”

Sora smiled. “Thanks for coming by. I’ll walk you out so Leon doesn’t have to pretend he wasn’t eavesdropping.”

As Sora led him back through the dark house, Roxas wondered if he’d done enough or said enough to fix what he’d helped to break. Even a week ago, he probably would have been satisfied to know that Sora was hurting like this, after how much Sora had put him through without even knowing it. But Riku had come to his show, even though he hadn’t been invited, even though Roxas was no longer fake dating him, even though the most intimate their friendship had gotten outside of sex was Roxas telling Riku his parents' names. Roxas _did_ care about Riku, but he hadn’t realized quite how much Riku cared about him back.

He paused on the front step and turned to look at Sora. “I’m sorry I tried to make you feel like you weren’t everything to him. Please don’t blame him for what I did.”

“You’re a good friend, Roxas,” Sora said with a small smile. “I really do hope one day we can be friends, too.”

The door closed quietly. Roxas stuffed his hands in his pockets and headed back across the street, where Kairi sat in the passenger seat with her feet up on the dash and some rock song blasting from her Gummiphone. She paused it as he climbed into the car.

“Well?”

“I don’t know,” Roxas admitted. “I guess we’ll just have to see.”

The touch of her hand over his made him look at her instead of starting the car. Her smile was bright and her eyes brighter. “Thanks for sharing this night with me.”

And his stupid, stupid heart fluttered in his chest.

“Yeah,” he said, his voice cracking only a little. “Any time.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alas, I didn't leave all of my troubles in 2019. My mom is very sick right now, and so the next chapter might not come next Sunday. I'll aim for it, but I wanted to give you guys a head's up if it's late. Sorry to leave you guys at this sad point in the story, but thank you for reading and I'll hopefully see you next Sunday!


	6. Dearly Beloved

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Happy Valentine's Day! Riku and Sora have sex in this one.

_Bang. Bang._

It was a couple of hours before his alarm was due to go off when Riku was ripped out of sleep. Someone was pounding on his front door so hard that the entire house seemed to shake. He blinked the exhaustion from his eyes, his cheek still smushed against the pillow, his mind trying to make sense of where he was. But the knocking cut through all that, drowning out his half formed thoughts.

_Bang. Bang. BANG._

He pulled on a pair of boxers on his way out of the bedroom, his jaw cracking on a wide yawn. The banging was an unrelenting drum line dogging his every step toward the door. By the time he made it there, Riku was annoyed enough to start swinging on whichever reporter or rowdy neighbor thought this time and this method was the best way to get his attention.

But it was neither a reporter nor a rowdy neighbor on his porch. Instead, it was Sora, staring up at him with red-rimmed eyes that burned with a strange determination that pinned Riku in place.

“Um,” Riku said. “Hey.”

“Hey,” Sora said, stepping past him into the house. Riku blinked once and closed the door behind him — only to find himself pressed up against it a second later.

“Um,” he said again.

“I want to kiss you,” Sora announced. “But I can literally smell your breath from here.”

Riku couldn’t help but smirk. “Sexy. Consider me wooed.”

“Shut up and go brush your teeth!”

He laughed on his way to the bathroom, the laughter a perfect release of the nervous energy now flooding his body. Sora was here. Sora wanted to kiss him. He had no idea why Sora had changed his mind about everything, let alone in the middle of the night after Roxas’ art show, but Riku wasn’t dumb enough to ask questions right now. He brushed his teeth so quickly his gums probably protested and hurried back out of the bathroom.

Riku found Sora waiting in the bedroom. And at this point he was shirtless.

“Um,” he said for the third time that night. “Am I dreaming?”

Sora smiled, all his glorious tan skin on display. “Do you have dreams like this often?”

“Well— _mmph_.”

Kissing Sora again for the first time in three years felt like coming home, even though Sora had slammed their lips together with all the subtlety of a freight train. Riku was pressed between the bedroom door and Sora’s body, his hands flying up to grab Sora’s hips and help him rock up on his tiptoes to lick his way into Riku’s mouth. The taste of mint was heavy on his tongue for a while, but Sora kissed him slowly and thoroughly until the toothpaste faded away and Riku could instead suck the taste of old coffee off of Sora’s tongue.

Sora moaned, pressing even closer, his hands sliding up Riku’s chest to rest over his racing heart. Sora felt so good, so warm and firm against him, and Riku’s restless hands couldn’t help but retrace the familiar dips and curves of Sora’s body. The soft swell of his pert ass, the smooth lines of his lightly muscled back, the jutting rows of his ribs beneath the soft skin at his sides, the gelled spikes of his otherwise fluffy hair. Riku’s thumbs pressed against the dip where Sora’s jaw met his neck, his hands cupping Sora’s cheeks as he dragged him into an even deeper kiss, his tongue dragging hot over Sora’s and sliding past to explore Sora’s mouth instead. Another, deeper moan welled up from Sora’s chest, and Riku made an answering sound that wavered with relief.

He’d fucking _missed_ this.

“Riku,” Sora murmured when they pulled back for air, breathing the words in between chaste pecks because they couldn’t seem to stop kissing now that they’d started. “Riku, I love you _so much_. You have to – Please tell me you know how much I–”

“I love you, too,” Riku whispered roughly. “I never stopped. I’ll never stop.”

Sora took a shaky breath and then dropped back onto his feet, his hands sliding down so he could tuck two fingers into the waistband of Riku’s boxers and tug. “Fuck me?”

“Oh my god,” Riku’s eyes slid shut, his half-hard cock visibly swelling between them. “You can’t just _say_ things like that.”

Sora smirked, giving his waistband another tug. “I don’t know. It seems like you’re into it.”

“It’s _you_. Of course I’m into it.”

Sora had the nerve to duck his head shyly, as if he hadn’t just been politely asking to be fucked, as if his hand wasn’t mere inches from Riku’s cock. Unable to help himself, Riku rocked forward to kiss him again, walking them both back toward the bed while his tongue reacquainted itself with every corner of Sora’s mouth. He swallowed each soft, delicious sound that Sora made, feeling them settle underneath his skin and heat him down to his very bones. He hadn’t been this turned on in _years_.

Riku pushed Sora down on the bed and stood over him, panting, his eyes dragging their way down from Sora’s wide-eyed flushed face to his sandal-covered feet and back up again. The contrast of Sora’s tan skin with Riku’s rumpled eggshell white sheets was breathtaking, even in the dim light offered by his bedside lamp. Sora looked sinful in his perfection, devastatingly seductive, and Riku’s heart hurt from the sight.

“I don’t want this to be another dream,” he said. “I couldn’t take—”

The feeling of Sora’s hand on his stomach cut him off. Sora sat up, sliding his arms around Riku’s waist and pressing his cheek to where his hand had just been. The affection made something in Riku settle, but having Sora’s face so close to his neglected dick made it twitch beneath his boxers. If Sora minded or even noticed, he didn’t show it.

“Just fuck me,” Sora whispered. “I’ll still be here in the morning, and we’ll talk then. But I really need to be close to you right now.”

Riku understood the feeling. He reached down to run his fingers through Sora’s messy hair, tracing the arc of Sora’s cheekbone for a moment. Then he said, “No shoes on the bed.”

Sora huffed out a laugh. “I remember.” He kicked off his sandals and wiggled up toward the headboard, where he laid back with his head against Riku’s pillows. His eyebrows jumped suggestively. “You coming?”

“That’s up to you,” Riku quipped, smiling at the delighted laughter Sora let out as Riku climbed on top of him.

Sora was still wearing a pair of black cargo shorts, while Riku was down to his underwear since he always slept naked. There was time to fix that, though. He paused for another long, slow kiss and then dragged his lips down the line of Sora’s neck, pausing to bite and suck and soothe with a swirl of his tongue, smirking every time Sora whimpered or shivered from the attention. They had practice, so he didn’t leave a mark, but the fact that Sora tilted his head to give Riku more access made him feel more powerful than anything ever had before.

Suddenly impatient, his hands tore at Sora’s clothes. When he pulled down Sora’s shorts, however, he heard a weird crinkling sound before they were even all the way off. Investigating the sound got him three condoms and two packets of lube from one of Sora’s side pockets.

Riku raised his eyebrows. “Pretty sure of yourself, weren’t you?”

“You said I was the love of your life,” Sora said breathlessly. “I figured my chances were good that Roxas’ dick didn’t ruin you for other men.”

It was on the tip of Riku’s tongue to joke that it was a pretty good dick, actually, but it felt too soon even if Sora had brought it up. He tore open the lube packet, smirking at the whimper Sora released just from the sight, and then leaned down to wrap his tongue around one of Sora’s nipples. Sora jolted like he’d been shot, a choked groan shaking out of him as Riku dragged his teeth over the hardening nub, and his head was tilted so far back it almost looked painful. Years of dexterity allowed Riku to switch between one nipple and the other while coating his fingers in lube, and Sora was so wrecked from the combination of tongue and teeth that he literally jumped when Riku pressed one damp finger against his hole.

“ _Fuck_ , Riku,” Sora moaned, rocking his hips down. His body seemed to suck Riku’s finger in greedily, like every part of Riku belonged inside of him. Riku’s cock twitched at the feeling of Sora so hot and tight around him. “ _Riku_ , I—”

“Did you not?” he asked, surprised by how low and breathless his own voice was. “Did – Wasn’t there anybody, this whole time?”

“I—Fuck—They—” Sora’s hands clenched the sheets in an iron grip, his cock smearing precome against his stomach. “They weren’t you. I tried, but I couldn’t—There was no point.”

And how could Riku not kiss him for that? His tongue slid into Sora’s mouth at the same time that he slipped another finger into Sora’s ass, swallowing all of Sora’s beautiful noises. He was always so gorgeous like this, letting Riku play his body like a symphony, his every reaction so open and unchecked. Riku scissored his fingers and pressed his forehead against Sora’s, panting as he gazed into Sora’s eyes.

“This probably won’t last long,” he admitted. “You have no idea how much I’ve wanted you.”

Sora wiggled around beneath him until he froze on a gasp, Riku’s fingers having brushed his prostate. “G-God, _you_ have no idea—Fuck me already, _please_. Ri— _Fuck_!” Riku stroked his fingers in and out of Sora’s hole, taking care to rub that spot every time he sank back in, loving the way Sora’s eyes rolled back into his head, the way he was reduced to incoherent babbling that vaguely sounded like Riku’s name. He didn’t even notice when Riku added a third finger; at the very least, the burn seemed to only encourage him to moan louder every time Riku brushed his prostate. “I’m—Shit, I’m gonna—Stop, Riku, you have to stop.”

Obediently, Riku pulled his fingers out and reached for the nearest condom, giving Sora a chance to catch his breath. Riku was so hard that even rolling on the condom made him hiss out a breath. He had to think of seeing Tidus’ bare ass in the shower to keep from coming just from the feel of his own hand slicking himself up.

By the time he had bottomed out inside of Sora, a slow, smooth glide made easy by the fact that Sora’s legs were wrapped around his waist and practically pulling him in, Riku was pretty sure he’d died and gone to heaven. There could be no other excuse for why Sora was naked and spread out underneath him, his walls clenching around Riku’s cock and making pleasure explode in starbursts throughout Riku’s body. There could be no other reason for why they were connected like this again, moving perfectly in sync, Sora’s hips rocking up to meet every thrust, Sora’s arms wrapped around Riku’s shoulders, Sora’s mouth open and panting against his cheek. Riku fucked Sora slowly, drawing almost all the way out before slamming back in again, his groans mixing with Sora’s cries of pleasure, and he thought that if he had to die, then this was definitely how he wanted to go.

“Harder,” Sora whimpered, and Riku was helpless to do anything but give him what he wanted.

His hands pinned Sora’s hips to the bed, and he used that leverage to drive into him, slamming into Sora so hard that the bed shook beneath them.

“Yes, fuck, right there,” Sora shouted, his voice cracking on the second word, and Riku knew he’d found that spot again. “Oh my god, oh shit—Riku—!”

“Sora, I’m close,” Riku grunted into his neck, their bruising pace shooting him toward the edge far too quickly.

Sora’s hand worked between them, squeezing the head of his cock and stroking it in time with Riku’s rapid thrusts. Riku made the mistake of looking down to watch and then he cursed as his orgasm slammed into him, Sora’s name the only sound he knew how to make. He shook from the overwhelming pleasure of it all, his body practically ascending in that white-hot moment. Sora tightened around his still-twitching cock and came with a cry, shooting pearls of come as high up as his chest and coating his hand with the sticky fluid.

Riku collapsed on top of Sora, breathing hard, and felt the rapid rise and fall of Sora’s chest beneath his cheek.

“Oh my god,” Sora breathed. “I think you killed me.”

“Joke’s on you, I’ve been dead this whole time,” Riku managed. “Was it always that good or did absence make the heart grow fonder?”

“Oh, fuck you, it’s always been this good!” Sora laughed, a weak, wheezing thing. “That first time notwithstanding.”

“You mean when you elbowed me in the balls?”

“I repeat: fuck you.”

“Maybe tomorrow.” Riku’s eyes slid shut, a peaceful smile crossing his face. “I’m glad you’re here.”

“Don’t fall asleep, Riku! We’ve got to clean up…”

But Riku was already drifting down into the best rest he’d had in years.

Sora woke up warm, sated, and with something hard poking him in the back.

He smiled as last night came back to him in flashes of heat that made his own dick twitch with the need for friction. The bed still smelled like sex, since Sora had only managed to get a damp cloth to clean himself up and had then thrown out the condom before passing out, too. Riku hadn’t even stirred when Sora had pulled it off. Sora almost felt bad for waking him up so early.

A warm kiss was brushed against the back of his neck and his smile widened. Then again, Riku would have gotten up to go run a few hours after Sora’s arrival anyway, so he didn’t feel _that_ bad.

“Clearly I didn’t do my job well enough last night,” Sora teased, cracking one eye open. The most he could see of Riku from this angle was a shock of silver hair as Riku placed another kiss behind his ear. “If you’re still this energetic.”

“You underestimate your considerable appeal,” Riku murmured. “I can’t have a Sora in my bed and not touch him.”

Sora reached back to take Riku’s hand and place it over his hard dick. “Well, far be it for me to stop you.”

Sora was still slick and loose enough that Riku was able to slide right back inside with minimal prep once he’d grabbed another condom. Hot and hard and so perfect that Sora held his breath until Riku bottomed out, his body ablaze with how good it felt, how mind-boggling perfect it was to take Riku this deep. Riku pressed his forehead against Sora’s hair, panting against his neck as Sora’s walls fluttered around the intrusion, and Sora could picture the look on his face so easily that he whined.

“We need to talk,” Riku breathed.

“You’re _literally_ inside of me.” Sora intentionally clenched down around Riku’s dick, basking in the strangled groan he received in return. “Talk later. Sex now.”

Thankfully, Riku took him at his word, shifting a leg between both of Sora’s to open him up more. His cock slid in and out slowly, a gentle rocking that sent delicious sparks of heat throughout Sora’s body. Riku was wrapped so tightly around him, all muscle and warmth, and Sora was sleepy and happy and practically vibrating with pleasure. He wanted to wake up like this every day for the rest of his life. He couldn’t believe he’d gone three years without it.

His eyes fluttered shut as he lost himself to the rhythm of their bodies, the slap of skin against skin, the chorus of Riku’s muffled sounds united with Sora’s own free whimpers. Riku’s hand tightened around his dick and began to stroke in time with the thrust of his hips, rendering Sora incoherent from the feedback loop of sensations. Pressing back made Riku’s cock slip deeper inside him, brushing his prostate at random intervals, and rutting forward made Riku squeeze tighter on every stroke. Sora was shaking from how good it was, shaking and and panting and begging for more.

“Please, please, Riku, _please_ ,” Sora whined, his toes curling in the sheets.

Riku released a shuddering breath. “Sora, I can’t—”

Sora could feel his cock pulsing inside him as Riku came with a garbled sound that was probably his name. Riku pressed another kiss to the back of his neck, soft and sweet and affectionate, and it was that more than anything else that pushed Sora over the edge. He tipped his head back against Riku and cried out as he spilled over Riku’s hand, trembling from the aftershocks.

By the time he got his breath back, Riku had eased out of him and was now trailing kisses along his shoulders and back. Sora’s heart swelled with love for him, the same love that had dragged him out of his room after Roxas had left and sent him to Riku’s front door. Though that love still warred with the anger he felt when he thought of the last few weeks, he didn’t regret a thing. He was right where he wanted to be.

And then his stomach growled.

Riku laughed. “Want some breakfast with your tough conversations?”

“Okay.” Sora rolled over to face him, laying a hand against Riku’s cheek and kissing him. “I love you.”

Riku’s entire face seemed to light up with joy, and it was only witnessing this expression now that Sora realized how long it had been since he’d seen Riku this happy. “I love you, too.”

God, Sora loved him _so much_.

Riku kissed him again and then slipped out of the bed. Sora smiled, snuggling back into the sheets as he listened to the distant sound of Riku cleaning up in the bathroom. Once he heard the water shut off, he stretched, wincing a little at the slight sting of his overworked hole, and rolled out of bed to take a shower.

By the time he made it to the kitchen, there was a smorgasbord of food waiting. Golden pancakes slathered with chocolate syrup, fluffy eggs crowned with melted cheese, and a plate of bacon that still seemed to be sizzling. Riku was roasting sausages when Sora walked in, at least until he glanced up to smile at Sora and nearly knocked the frying pan off the stove.

“You’re—um—You,” Riku said, his eyes not on Sora’s face.

Sora glanced down at himself. Since he hadn’t thought to bring a change of clothes, he was wearing one of Riku’s old blitzball jerseys and a pair of Riku’s boxers. He’d had to tie the boxers at the waist, because even with the elastic, they slipped down his narrower hips. “What? Is it inappropriate to be sharing underwear now? I know it’s been three years, but we just—”

“No,” Riku said quickly. “No, that’s not. No. You just. You look great. You can wear whatever you want.”

Sora realized, as Riku swiftly turned back to the stove with a flush high in his cheeks, that Riku was _turned on again_. He tried not to smile as he took a seat.

“So.” Riku had managed to wait for Sora to clear an entire plate and be picking at a second before his curious looks and nervous frowns materialized into a way to start the conversation. Sora was trying not to find that endearing. “I don’t want to assume anything but… does this mean you forgive me?”

Sora set his fork down and sighed. “I mean. Yes and no? I’m still pretty mad at you, is the thing. But I spoke to Roxas—”

“You _what_?”

“—and he said something that made me realize it doesn’t matter whether or not I’m still mad at you. No matter how mad I am, I don’t want to be the thing standing in the way of us getting back together.” Sora’s cheeks burned. “I mean, if you want to get back together. It’s okay if you don’t—”

“—Of course I do. Sora, come on. Of course.” Riku reached across the table to take his hand, giving him a reassuring smile. “But is it a good idea to get back together if you already resent me for something? I don’t want things to go wrong again.”

“They won’t,” Sora insisted, giving Riku’s hand a squeeze because he could. Because he had that right again. “I’ve learned how to be without you for three years, and I don’t like it. I’d rather be angry and with you than angry and without you. Because I know we’ll work it out. And I know that eventually I’ll stop being angry with you. But I’ll never stop being in love with you.”

Riku’s smile was beautific. Sora wondered if there was anything he wouldn’t do to make Riku smile like that forever.

He ducked his head to hide a smile of his own. “Anyway, I think… I mean, like I said, I definitely want to get back together. But I think we should take it slow to start with.”

Riku snorted.

“And _yes_ ,” Sora continued as if he hadn’t interrupted, “I realize it’s ridiculous to say that after we had sex twice, but I didn’t mean _physically_. More like — I want to call you my boyfriend again, but I don’t think I should move back in yet. I want to try living on my own for a while first. If that’s okay.”

“Of course that’s okay.” Riku kept holding Sora’s hand as he went back to his breakfast, and that simple thing made Sora feel warm all over. “You don’t even have to move back in _here_ if you don’t want to. We could sell the place and buy a new one together, when it’s time.”

“Okay, but what about you?”

“Huh?”

“Do you have anything you want or aren’t ready for or…?”

Riku chewed quietly and considered this, for which Sora felt profoundly grateful. He didn’t want to be the only one setting boundaries on their relationship. Finally, Riku said, “I think we should see if your therapist does group sessions and, if so, see her together for a bit. Just to make sure we’re communicating the way we should be and dealing with things we should be.”

Sora brought their joined hands to his mouth and brushed his lips against Riku’s knuckles. “I think that’s a good idea. I’ll call her and ask about it later.”

“And,” Riku continued, his voice and eyes warm, “I don’t think we should go public with this right away. Things are different than they were when we first started going out. If there’s anything I learned from the whole thing with Roxas, it’s that people don’t give a shit about our privacy. The longer we can protect it, the longer we can protect… us. And this means too much to me to let other people get in our heads.”

“Okay,” Sora easily agreed. Riku smiled, satisfied, and Sora let their hands fall back to the table as they both finished eating their breakfast, sneaking pleased looks at each other across the table like the _boyfriends_ they now were. Again.

So it was really no surprise when they ended up on the couch, rutting against each other like horny teenagers. Sora’s hands were under Riku’s shirt, sliding over his muscled stomach, and Riku’s hands were dragging Sora’s borrowed boxers down his hips so he could get at his cock. Sora groaned as Riku’s fingers slid around the slick head and surged upward to get his tongue in Riku’s mouth.

“HEY!”

Riku jerked away from him, his hand tightening in shock, making Sora hiss and arch his back. Riku quickly let go of him and Sora, panting, let his head drop back to see Kairi standing in front of the door with a hand over her eyes.

“I’ve been calling your names for almost a full minute. _Please_ stop, this is getting voyeuristic.”

“Hi, Kairi,” Riku said, sounding like he wanted nothing more than for the house to collapse on top of him and spare him the embarrassment of this moment.

Sora fought to get his breathing under control, his own face burning. “Um, hi, Kairi. Do you want to, uh, wait in the kitchen and give us a moment to—”

“Yeah. Yes.” Kairi said, her eyes still covered. “Sorry. Leon said you’d come over here, and I didn’t realize how literally he meant that.” She gave a high, nervous laugh and practically sprinted toward the kitchen.

Sora clenched his eyes shut. “Riku, _why_ does she have a key to your house?”

“It’s a long story,” Riku muttered. “Let’s just—pick this up later.”

Sora sighed. His erection was gone now, anyway. “Yeah, okay.”

Kairi stared across the table at her two best friends, neither of whom could meet her eyes.

“Are you guys back together,” she asked when it became clear that neither of them was going to start this conversation. “Or did one of you just trip and fall on the other one’s dick?”

She sounded tired even to her own ears, and it wasn’t from a lack of sleep. Roxas had dropped her off shortly after his conversation with Sora, and though it had seemed like he’d wanted to say something he’d let her out of the car with little more than a warm smile and a promise to see her soon. Kairi’s heart fluttered when she thought of last night, and she was riding that high as far as it would take her. No, her current exhaustion had nothing to do with sleep and everything to do with the fact that once again Riku had run off and done something rash and left her to find out and deal with it only after it was done.

Was there any way to spin this that wouldn’t make it seem like Riku had been cheating on Roxas with Sora? Kairi could feel a headache coming on.

“—see how it goes,” Sora was saying when she tuned back in. “Because we’re in love and stuff, so.”

Riku was smiling at him with such open fondness that Kairi wondered how he’d thought for even a second that he was capable of moving on, let alone with Roxas. It clearly hadn’t worked.

She sighed. “Okay, well. Let’s talk about your statements—”

“No,” said Riku. “We’re not going public with this. Not right away, anyway.”

Kairi blinked. “Oh. Well. That’s… easier, I guess.”

Sora wiggled out from under the arm Riku had around his shoulders and started putting together a plate of food that he eventually set in front of Kairi. She ate it more to be polite than anything else, since it gave her an excuse to still be sitting there. If they weren’t going public, they didn’t need her, and she’d clearly interrupted them in the middle of something. Though neither of them were saying anything, she wondered how badly they wanted her to leave.

Riku sighed abruptly. “Listen, Kairi, I actually wanted to talk to you about something. But I’m not sure how to go about it.”

“Uh oh,” Sora stage whispered. “Last time he started a conversation like that, he told me he’s been emotionally torturing me with a fake relationship on purpose for over a month.”

Riku gave him a look, and Sora gave him a dazzling smile in response. Kairi cleared her throat to remind them both that she was there.

“Anyway,” Riku said, dragging his eyes away from Sora at last. “I was thinking maybe you shouldn’t be my publicist anymore.”

In the aftermath of his words, Kairi’s sole comfort was that the ringing silence that followed proved that Sora was just as taken aback by this as she was. Her fingers clenched the fabric of her skirt, her throat bobbing as she swallowed. “Did I… do something wrong?”

“No, of course not! It’s more like _I’ve_ done something wrong.”

“‘It’s not you, it’s me’?”

“I’m not saying this right,” Riku seemed to look to Sora for help, but Sora’s expression clearly communicated he was on his own. Riku tucked a lock of silver hair behind his ear and met her eyes again. “I just feel like our business relationship is kind of hurting our friendship. When’s the last time we just hung out to hang out?”

Kairi opened her mouth to answer him, and then her mind went blank. Because all of the times she could think of, as far back as she could think of them, were more like business meetings. And before that, all the times she could think of had been with Sora present. When had she and Riku, alone, just hung out to hang out? Maybe not since college. Maybe not since high school.

She frowned. “You want to fire me so you can hang out with me? Where’d you get that idea?”

Kairi didn’t say that she should have seen this coming. Kairi didn’t say that she’d been fucking up and what was one more thing? Kairi definitely didn’t say that it made perfect sense that Riku would fire her the moment he got Sora back, because what did he need her for when he had Sora? She just tried not to look like she wanted to vault out of her chair and run for the street to avoid this conversation.

“Part of it came from Roxas. You knew about his art show and I didn’t even know you guys talked, let alone hung out.” Riku held up a hand like he knew she was about to apologize. “What I mean is more like… we’re friends, Kairi, and I barely know anything about your life. And I only really tell you about my life when you need to do your job. My life _is_ your job, kind of. That’s probably really stressful.”

Kairi thought of Xion and Naminé begging her to get a life and blushed. “I love being a publicist, Riku. I don’t want you to think I don’t—”

“No, I know. I can tell. But between that and, well, getting Sora back, it just kind of made me miss the old days. When the three of us hung out, just as friends. When we were friends. Not that Sora and I were ever really platonic, but…”

“Now that you mention it,” Sora murmured. “I don’t know the last time all three of us hung out together like we’re doing right now.”

“We’re not hanging out,” Kairi corrected. “This is a business meeting. Or, well, it _was_.” She paused. “Okay, Riku, I think I see your point.”

Riku and Sora both looked at her like they expected her to know what to do next, and Kairi supposed that was fair. As part of her job, she projected an air of confidence and competency, of shrewd business sense and well-dressed instincts. And that was all she’d really shown them, these last few years, so of course they would have forgotten that she was just as lost and confused as they were. Maybe even more so.

“Well,” she said, instead of any of that. “I’ll… talk with my agency, I guess. See what the best method to part ways would be.”

“And then maybe after that the three of us can just hang out again?” Riku asked hopefully. “Like actual friends?”

Kairi couldn’t help but smile. “Yeah, of course. I’d like that.”

She brought her empty plate over to the sink and ran water over it to dislodge any lingering food. By the time she was drying her hands with a paper towel, Sora had volunteered to walk her out. She tried not to be surprised by the gallantry. She would have thought that he and Riku would want to get right back to… each other.

Of course, Sora had all the subtlety of a car fire. So he followed Kairi out onto the front steps, closed the door behind himself, and blurted, “Did you used to have a crush on me?”

Kairi’s whole life flashed before her eyes. Her warning that he was standing outside in a pair of sagging boxers and an oversized jersey died in her throat. She’d never had a stroke before, but she was pretty sure she was having one now. She wondered if passing out would get her out of this conversation.

“Um,” she heard herself say. “What?”

“A crush. Did you ever have a crush on me?”

“Wha—Where is this coming from all of a sudden?”

Sora rubbed the back of his neck. “I mean, it’s okay if you did. Or do. It’s okay. I’d be flattered—”

“Please stop talking,” Kairi’s voice had gotten higher in pitch, “Please stop talking right now.”

“—but I just want to know. Mostly I want to know if you like me _right now_.”

Kairi shook her head before he’d even finished talking, as if she could shake this memory from her brain before it was over. “I don’t even—You’re with Riku again. Why does this even matter?”

“Because _you_ matter,” Sora said simply. That caught Kairi off guard just as much as his question had. Maybe more.

Her cheeks burned hot as she turned to look out at the street. “I—When we were younger? Yeah, I did. But I saw what was between you and Riku right away, I promise. And I would never have—I would never do anything to come between you guys. You know that right?”

Sora came up beside her, giving her a bright smile even though she refused to look directly at him. “I know. I never really saw anyone who wasn’t Riku, anyway. But do you still…?”

Kairi’s face felt like it was on fire. “What are you trying to get me to say, Sora? Seriously, where is all of this coming from?”

“Well,” Sora rubbed the back of his neck again. “Roxas told me that you have a crush on me.”

“ _Roxas_ told you that I have a crush on you?”

“Yeah, kind of.”

“Roxas thinks I have a crush on _you_?”

“Big time.”

“Why were you talking to Roxas about me?!”

Sora held up his hands as if he was going to try to fend her off. “That’s between me and Roxas. But, anyway, he said that, and it sounded ridiculous to me, but I guess I just wanted to check?”

Now Kairi’s entire body felt like it was on fire, but not from embarrassment. “I,” she said calmly. “Am going to kill him.”

“Wait, Kairi, no—”

“Just going to tear his stupid hair right off his head and feed it to him.”

“He was only trying to help—”

“Smash his camera into pieces right in front of him and then feast on his tears.”

“ _Kairi_.” Sora grabbed her shoulders before she could march off, his eyes big and blue. “Listen, Roxas cares about you a lot. And I don’t know if you still have a crush on me or not, but if you do, then you deserve to be with someone else who cares about you a lot. And if you don’t, then you still deserve that.”

Kairi’s heart pounded from the words more than his proximity. “Did he say that? That he cares about me?”

“I think you guys should talk. Like, _actually_ talk to each other.” Sora let her go and took a step back. “After everything he did to get me and Riku back together, I think Roxas is a really great guy. And it seems to me like the two of you keep getting your wires crossed because you both have low self-esteem.”

“Wow,” Kairi said. “What are you, my therapist?”

Sora laughed, though she didn’t think she’d said anything that funny. He practically shoved her down the sidewalk. “Go talk to him. Jeez. The two of you are _ridiculous_.”

“I’m not the one on the sidewalk in my boyfriend’s boxers with a hickey on the back of my neck,” Kairi called back to him. She didn’t turn around, but she heard Sora yelp followed by the sound of the front door slamming. A smile crossed her face.

A smile that faded when she remembered Roxas and his loose lips.

“I’m going to kill him,” she muttered to herself and went to hail a cab.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My mom said she didn't want to be the reason I wasn't getting any writing done, but I feel like if she'd known exactly what I was writing while sitting with her then she wouldn't have said that... Regardless, you can thank her for this. See you Sunday, February 23rd!


	7. Game, Set, Match

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Riku and Sora have sex in this one, too. Sora finds a new home. Happy endings abound.

Sora knew he'd ever get tired of this.

Riku’s cock was splitting him open for the third time since he’d woken up that morning. His legs were spread on either side of Riku’s bare lap and he was rocking on top of Riku’s dick, adjusting to the stretch and sting, his fingers tight on Riku’s shoulders for balance. He loved taking it like this, his forehead resting against Riku’s, their mouths within kissing distance, his damp bare skin rubbing against Riku’s muscled torso every time he rolled his hips. Riku’s hands gripped the swell of his ass to lever him up and down faster, and Riku’s pupils had swallowed his aquamarine irises, and Riku’s mouth was open around a throaty moan of Sora’s name, and _yes_. This. Always, this.

Sora brushed their lips together, whispering, “Love you,” into Riku’s mouth like a honeyed secret.

One of Riku’s hands slid up to the small of his back, pressing them tighter together, making Sora’s cock grind against Riku’s abs with every hitching thrust. “Come on, Sora,” Riku murmured back. “Take what you need.”

And, damn, if that didn’t make Sora slam himself down harder, riding Riku with little cries he couldn’t keep in even if he’d tried. Riku pressed a kiss to the sensitive point where Sora’s neck met his shoulder, then stayed there, panting, as Sora rocked up and down. A shiver hummed down his spine, heat curling in his stomach, white-hot pleasure just within his grasp. Then Riku grabbed hold of his hips and thrust up as Sora was fucking down, hitting Sora’s prostate with enough force that he went cross-eyed and came immediately.

His entire body exploded into bubbling sparks of ecstasy and, when he finally managed to gather his wits, he found himself draped over Riku’s shoulders, Riku’s lips pressed against his forehead, Riku’s fingers buried in his hair. Riku’s soft cock was still inside him, and he groaned when Sora smirked and clenched down around him.

“I cannot physically come for you again today,” Riku breathed. “I am absolutely willing to try, but the flesh is weak, Sora.”

Sora laughed. “You want me to get out of here so you can get some sleep before practice?”

“No.” Riku stroked a hand down Sora’s spine and then back up again. “But that’s not my brain talking.”

Sora kissed him on the nose, delighting in the way Riku snickered at the gesture.

“I’ll come back over afterward. Surely we’ve gotten all of the sex out of our system by now, so we can just cuddle and watch a movie or something.”

“We tried that yesterday.”

And they had. Sora had insisted that they watch _Tangled_ again, and somehow before Rapunzel had even gotten out of her tower, Riku had been on his knees sucking Sora down. Sora had never gotten blown to the soundtrack of a Disney movie before, but he supposed most of his firsts were with Riku, so what was one more?

“Good point.” Sora finally climbed off of Riku’s lap, making a face at the empty feeling left behind when Riku slid out of him. He wandered into the bathroom to clean himself up and returned with a damp washcloth to find Riku lying on the dry side of the bed, the condom discarded, an arm thrown over his face. “We could have dinner with my dads, maybe? That’ll keep our hands off each other for sure.”

Riku snorted as Sora swiped the washcloth over the mess on his stomach. “Please don’t talk about your dads when you’re naked and your come’s still drying on me.”

“You’re also naked,” Sora pointed out, flicking him on the chin. “I’ll call Cloud and tell him you’re coming.”

Riku snorted again. It took Sora a moment to get the innuendo and then he groaned — and not in a sexual way.

“Okay, that’s it, clean your _self_ up!” he said, dropping the washcloth and grabbing a pillow to smack Riku in the face with. “ _Goodbye, Riku_.”

Riku continued laughing sleepily as Sora gathered his clothes. Because he wasn’t heartless, he doubled back to the bed to collect the washcloth and give Riku a long, lingering kiss that tempted him to climb right in beside him again. But they needed to stop stretching so many muscles before practice, or they’d strain themselves and Axel would kill them.

“Take a nap,” Sora said after one more kiss. “I’ll see you later.”

Riku pecked him on the forehead as he drew away. “I love you.”

Sora was smiling as he let himself out of the house, so distracted by his own boundless happiness that he nearly tripped right over Roxas. Roxas looked as surprised to see Sora as Sora was to see him, as if he’d forgotten that a potential result of their last conversation might be running into Sora where he expected to see Riku.

“Hey,” Roxas said after a moment, lowering the hand that had been reaching for the doorbell. “Is, uh. Is Riku in?”

“He’s asleep, I think. Or he will be soon.” said Sora, leaning against the door. “Why? What’s up?”

Roxas considered this for so long that Sora was about to take it back just so Roxas wouldn’t have to feel awkward about trying to explain that he didn’t trust Sora the way he clearly trusted Riku. But then Roxas looked around and winced. “Can we… go somewhere else? Maybe back to mine, if you don’t have anywhere else to be?”

Conscious of the fact that he probably still smelled like Riku, Sora just nodded and followed Roxas to his car.

Roxas lived in an apartment that looked more like a museum. It was sparsely furnished and full of unopened boxes, and half-opened bags that spilled a variety of clothes onto the floor. The kitchen was fully stocked and there were framed photographs on some of the walls, but the overall effect was of more an apartment viewing than an actual apartment.

“Sorry, I’m still kind of getting settled,” Roxas said as they entered, running his hand through his hair. “If you can find somewhere to sit, take a seat.”

There was a single chair at the kitchen island. Sora hopped up onto it and peered at Roxas. “So, what’s up? I haven’t seen or heard from you in a week, so I thought Kairi actually murdered you.”

“I was out of town,” Roxas muttered, pacing on the other side of the kitchen island. “She left me a voicemail. A _very terrifying_ voicemail. So I haven’t told her I’m back in town yet.”

“Okay…” Sora drawled. “You guys aren’t together then?”

Roxas began pacing faster. “I don’t know if that’s what she wants! I thought we were close to something, the night of my art show, but then the next day she leaves me this voicemail and now I have no idea where we stand or what she wants. I’m.” Roxas abruptly stopped and then covered his face with both hands, which made him look like an adorable toddler. “This is why I hate _feeling_ _things_! I hate this. This is the worst.”

Sora tried very hard not to laugh. Growing up, Riku had often teased him about being the kind of boy who would burst into tears if he saw a poor hermit crab that hadn’t yet found a new shell, and here was Roxas freaking out because he had experienced a human emotion. How had Riku ended up going from Sora to _this guy_? He really needed to find the time to ask one of these days.

“Okay, okay,” Sora said, rounding the kitchen island to grab Roxas’ shoulders. “Breathe. Here. Sit.” He marched him over to the chair and pushed him down into it. “Relax. Whatever Kairi said, I’m sure she didn’t mean it. She totally likes you!”

Roxas looked like Sora was trying to tell him that the tooth fairy was real. Sora wondered if he would get in trouble for dragging Roxas to Kairi’s apartment just so he could knock their heads together.

“She _does_. Look, you need to tell her how you feel about her, or we’re never going to get anywhere.”

“‘We’?” Roxas repeated with a raised eyebrow. “I thought you and Riku were busy banging all over his house.”

“We are, thank you,” said Sora. “But we’re only doing that because of you, and so I’m emotionally invested in seeing you have a happy ending, too. Especially when I know Kairi likes you back.”

Roxas had rolled his eyes at Sora’s use of the word ‘happy ending’, but he didn’t actually say anything sarcastic about it. Instead, he said, “I just have no idea what I’m doing when it comes to her.” He ran a hand through his hair again. “How did you and Riku get together?”

“Uh, blitzball, actually,” Sora admitted. “It brought us together, it tore us apart, and then it brought us back together. But our case was kind of different, since the whole island knew we wanted each other bad and we probably would’ve died not doing anything about it if not for a blitzball game.”

“I’m starting to regret playing a role in getting you guys back together.”

“Look, don’t think about us. Kairi’s different. She’s…” Sora paused for a moment, remembering the first day he’d met Kairi. A girl sitting alone in the window of the mayor’s house, staring out at all of them playing. The longing in her eyes. The kindness in her smile. The joy that seemed to light her from the inside out when Sora first came to say hello. “She’s lost a lot of family, and she had to start over in a completely new place with a member of her family who didn’t even come to her grandmother’s funeral. She makes friends easily, but no one really _knows_ her, you know? She’s used to people being able to just move on without her. No one ever fights for her. I think that’s all she really wants. Someone who’s willing to fight for her. And _you_ ,” he shoved at Roxas’ shoulder. “Are the most belligerent person I have _ever_ met, so what’s even the problem?”

Roxas batted his hand away, but there was a thoughtful expression on his face.

“Now, stop being such a weenie, and go get your girl!” Sora finished. “Metaphorically speaking, because she is a grown woman with agency who belongs to no one.”

“Thanks, Sora,” Roxas said after a long moment of staring at him as if he couldn’t quite believe that Sora was a real person. “Seriously, thank you. It’s nice to have a,” he paused, the next word coming out uncertain, “Friend like you.”

Sora had to resist the urge to throw his arms around Roxas, because he got the feeling that would be taking this a step too far. So instead he just grinned brightly, “It’s nice to have a friend like you, too, dude. And, as your friend, may I suggest you actually unpack some of these boxes? It looks sad and empty in here.”

Roxas sighed. “I’m just not sure how long I’m going to be able to keep staying here unless I find a roommate to split the rent with me after next month. I don’t suppose you’re looking for a place?”

“Wait… really?” Sora blinked. “Wouldn’t that be awkward as hell?”

“I feel like everything that’s happened since I met you has been awkward.”

“…That’s fair.”

Sora glanced around the apartment again, assessing it as more than just a reflection of Roxas’ personality this time. It was a nice space, he thought. With some work, it could be bright, airy, and even cozy. And he and Roxas did get along better than they did weeks ago, especially for two people who had had sex with the same guy…

“I’ll think about it,” he said at last. “But right now I should go home and shower. We have practice later.”

“Yeah, I wasn’t going to mention it,” Roxas deadpanned. “But you smell like a whore.”

“Always nice to see you, too, Roxas.”

Kairi wasn’t sure what to expect when she let Roxas up to her apartment, but it wasn’t to open the door to see a flower shop. Then the flowers twitched, and she realized that Roxas was behind them, barely balancing them in his spindly arms. Stunned into silence, Kairi just stepped aside to let him into the studio, kicking the door closed with her teddy bear slippers and turning to face him.

The last time they’d spoken — well, the last time she’d spoken to him — it had been via a furious voicemail message that Kairi could still recite by heart. When Axel had told her that Roxas had left the Islands for a week, and without a word to her at that, she’d stood right there on Axel’s front porch and went off.

 _“Fuck you, Roxas! This has been the most humiliating day of my_ life _! I can’t believe Sora knows! I can’t believe you_ told _him! I can’t believe one of my best friends knows I was pining after him like a pathetic little kid. I managed to escape that rejection when I actually_ was _a pathetic little kid, but luckily I have you around to make sure I get it retroactively in my 20s! How dare you not be here so I can throttle you in person, you piece of shit? I hate you so much!”_

And then after ten minutes she had called back and left a second voicemail: _“I don’t actually hate you. I’m sorry I said that, and I hope you’re okay. But I’m really, REALLY mad at you!”_

Roxas hadn’t returned her call, even in a text, so she had assumed… well, she hadn’t known what to assume. She’d just done her best to go about her life, even though she’d lost Riku as a client and could no longer take Sora on as a client for the same reasons. She’d lost some esteem at her public relations company, and that was… whatever. Xion, Naminé, and Selphie had all agreed this would be good for her, and Kairi was trying to believe that.

But now Roxas was in her house with what truly looked like the entire contents of a flower shop, and she just had no idea what to do.

“Um,” she said. “Did you rob a flower shop? And, if so, why’d you bring your spoils here?”

“These are for you,” Roxas replied once he finished arranging them around and on top of her coffee table. There were magnolias and daisies, orchids and tulips, lilies and even roses of three different shades. “I used what was left of the money from my show.”

Kairi wavered between being bewildered and being flattered. No one had ever bought her flowers before. No one had ever even wanted to. “I’m still mad at you,” she said, but her voice came out doubtful. “Did you listen to my voicemails?”

“I did. And you have every right to be mad at me.” Roxas slid his hands into his pockets, but his elbows jiggled as though he couldn’t quite keep still. “I just – _Do_ you still like Sora?”

“Do I still like Sora?” Kairi sputtered. “ _Sora_? I’ve been throwing myself at _you_ practically since the day we _met_!”

Roxas looked so genuinely puzzled that she wanted to grab one of her couch pillows and hit him with it. “ Since the day we—? You shut that down so fast I thought you were over it!”

“ _I_ shut it down? You were sleeping with Riku! You _still_ were up until last month!”

“I thought I didn’t have a chance with you! Do you really think if I’d met you before I met Riku, that I would have been sleeping with him instead of you? You’re the only person I’ve ever liked!”

“You have the worst way of showing it!”

“I’m bad at feelings!”

“That’s _not_ an excuse!”

“I’m not _excusing_ it.” At some point, the space between them had closed until they were shouting in each other’s faces. Roxas stood before her now, his hands coming up to rest on her shoulders. “I’m just saying I’m bad at this. I’ve never liked anyone before. I’ve never wanted to be with someone like this before. I don’t know how to deal with it, and I’m going to get it wrong. I’ll probably get it wrong a lot. But I’m going to try my best, if you let me, because you’re worth the best I have to give and more. I just. Really, really. Fucking. Like you. _Okay_?”

Kairi stared up into his blue, blue eyes, her heart pounding in her chest. “Really?” she asked weakly. “Because I can’t—I can’t be Riku for you.”

“And I can’t be Sora for you.”

“I _told_ you I don’t want Sora,” Kairi whispered. “I just want you.”

“You can do way better,” Roxas whispered back. “But I’m a selfish piece of shit and I don’t want anybody else.”

Kairi laughed, a weak, wet sound. She had no idea when she’d started crying, but she could feel the tears slick on her cheeks now. Roxas’ hands cupped them now, brushing the tears away with his thumbs, and the smile on his face made her want to swoon right into his arms. She only barely managed to keep herself standing.

“Can I kiss you?” he asked, studying her like he might be asked to sketch her face from memory later.

“Idiot,” Kairi replied, surging up to kiss him first. His lips were surprisingly soft, parted on a gasp of surprise, and she threw her arms around his neck to yank him down to her level so that she could control the kiss. The entire room smelled of flower blossoms and was silent except for their heavy breaths and the slick sound of their kisses and Kairi wanted to memorize this moment for the rest of her life. Someone had chosen her. Or, no, not chosen her, because that implied there had ever been another choice. Someone wanted _her_ , first and only, and it was a stupid, infuriating, insecure, emotionally constipated blonde photographer she’d set up in a fake relationship with her best friend a month ago.

Her life was _ridiculous_.

“You’re a fucking idiot,” she whispered against his mouth when they separated long enough to catch their breaths. “I can _not_ believe you thought I still liked Sora.”

“I can’t believe you thought I liked Riku,” Roxas said, kissing his way across her jawline. “I can’t believe _anyone_ would like Riku when you’re right here.”

Kairi laughed. “I know, right?” She tipped her head back so he could kiss a line of fire down her neck next. “You don’t have to lay it on so thick. I’m totally going to put out.”

“Good to know, but that’s not actually what I’m here for.” Roxas placed a sucking kiss just under her chin and then pulled away entirely, a playful smile on his face. “I came over to see if you wanted to hang out together. Maybe even on purpose. Maybe not even at a gocery store.”

Kairi’s face hurt from smiling at the reference to their first conversation, the day she’d been so sure she’d pulled a Selphie by actually picking up a guy in a supermarket, the day she’d been heartbroken over a stranger and tried for weeks to talk herself out of that heartbreak. Even now after she’d kissed him, after she’d told him she only wanted him, she could see nervousness in Roxas’ face as he waited for her answer. As if he thought she might change her mind.

Her beautiful idiot.

“Of course I still want to hang out with you,” she said, sliding her fingers between his, loving the way her small palm fit so perfectly against his. “Name the time and place and I’m there.”

“Le Grand Bistrot,” Roxas said immediately, a shy smile curving the corner of his mouth. “Maybe around 8? I can come pick you up.”

Kairi tilted her face up and beamed when Roxas took the hint and kissed her in response. “Sounds fun. What should I wear?”

“Whatever you want. I’ve never seen you look bad in anything.”

“Wait until you get a load of my bedhead. You might run screaming for the hills.”

Roxas squeezed her hand reassuringly. “Nah. If your voicemail didn’t scare me off, nothing will.”

Kairi ducked her head, feeling like she could float away from how happy she was. For a moment, she could even pretend that none of the bad things had happened, that she’d never seen that text message, that she and Roxas were making plans to hang out outside of that grocery store like they’d wanted in the first place. But then she let the moment dissipate. Maybe it had to happen this way. After everything they’d done and said and been through to be standing here, there wasn’t even a nasty voice at the back of her mind telling her that he would meet Riku and fall in love. He’d had sex with Riku for a year and still dropped him for Kairi at the earliest available opportunity.

She didn’t want to be petty, but she couldn’t deny the rush of pleasure knowing that gave her. It was a powerful thing, to be wanted. She hoped she made him feel as powerful as he made her feel.

“Now that everything’s out in the open…” Roxas said, drawing her attention back to him. “I guess I can admit that the _reason_ I told Sora you had a crush on him was because he was asking me why I seemed to hate him so much and I admitted it was because I thought you liked him instead of me.”

Kairi stared at him.

“And I obviously knew that Riku was in love with him, so it seemed unfair that he should have so many people who thought the sun shined out of his ass and I couldn’t even get one girl to go on a date with me… It sounds stupid as fuck now, though.” Roxas cleared his throat. “Especially since we’re kind of friends now, so I guess I like him, too.”

“Again,” Kairi said flatly. “I’d really like to point out the sheer audacity of you thinking I had a secret crush on Sora when you were literally _sleeping with Riku this entire time_ —”

Roxas backed her against the door and kissed her. And Kairi knew he was only doing it to shut her up, she knew that, but she couldn’t find it in herself to give a single fuck when his tongue was sliding between her lips and his hands were sliding down to her waist and her body was on fire everywhere she could feel him, smell him, taste him, _touch him_. She wondered if he could tell that she was starving for it. She felt like maybe she should be embarrassed about that, but she wasn’t.

He kissed her like he was starving for it, too.

She slid her hands under his shirt, feeling the heat of his bare skin above his jeans, and swallowed his soft moan. “Plenty of not-sex things we can do between now and 8pm,” she murmured with a wicked smile, drawing back just far enough to make sure he heard her.

Roxas was pink-cheeked and dark-eyed as he stared back at her.

Her smile widened. “Let’s see how many we can check off.”

**6 MONTHS LATER**

It ended with a gala.

Halfway through the season, the schedule of one match a month was interrupted by the Federation of International Blitzball Associates' Gala – FIBA Gala, for short. All it usually meant was that Riku had to put on a suit and pretend to schmooze with people from FIBA and players from teams he’d either beaten or wanted to beat for at least an hour and a half before he was allowed to sneak out the door.

This year, it meant he got to see Sora in a suit that he would peel him out of as soon as they’d stayed long enough to be polite. Riku had never looked forward to the FIBA Gala before, but Sora’s insistence that he would meet Riku at the banquet hall had made him rush through getting ready and calling for a car. He was almost eager enough to show up early, but had enough sense to have the car circle the block a few times so he didn’t look like that much of a dork.

The theme of this year’s gala was Under the Sea, and the banquet hall was decorated in aquamarines and lavenders, pale pink clamshells forming the plates that were bearing appetizers on the trays waiters were carrying around. Chapamgne flutes were decorated with mermaid tails, and a cake that looked like a trident was taking up an entire long table. The place was packed, but it didn’t take Riku long to find Sora. He could probably have found Sora blindfolded in the middle of the night.

Sora was wearing a light blue suit with a white shirt and a light blue vest. His tie was navy blue and perfectly knotted at the base of his throat, and the suit was well-fitted, showing off his trim waist and his broad shoulders. He turned before Riku had even made it all the way across the room, his eyes lighting up when they caught sight of him.

“Wow, Riku, you look—wow.”

Riku had gone for a slate grey suit with a forest green vest and green-and-black striped tie. His hands fisted at his sides from the effort of not touching Sora, even though every nerve in his body was screaming at him to kiss Sora on his gorgeous face right here in the middle of the biggest non-athletic event of the entire blitzball season. Something flashed in the corner of his eyes, reminding him how many photographers were here just waiting for him to do something like that.

But, fuck, Sora looked _so good_.

“You look wow, too,” Riku said with a smile that he hoped looked platonic and not like he was remembering what Sora looked like naked. “You were right not to let me see you before we got here.”

“We never would have made it out the door,” Sora grinned. He grabbed two glasses of champagne off a passing tray and handed Riku one. “Ready to schmooze?”

“How long before we can leave?”

Sora just laughed in response.

They found Axel by the cake table in a cherry red suit, arguing with a black dress-clad Xion about whether or not they could start cutting it themselves. Naminé stood with Xion, wearing a lavender off-the-shoulder gown with a pearl necklace around her neck. Tidus and Wakka were with Selphie out on the balcony, both in black suits and gold ties that matched her gold mini-dress. Aqua and Terra were with Ventus Ganelon, a blonde man who bore a remarkable resemblance to Roxas. Riku was pretty sure he was a journalist, but he honestly didn’t listen to Aqua and Terra enough to know for sure.

Though he caught sight of Olette and Pence, Hayner and Seifer were nowhere to be found, and Riku hoped that meant they hadn’t murdered each other.

“Maybe they’re fucking,” Sora suggested.

“What?” Riku blinked. “They hate each other.”

“You’re adorable,” Sora rocked up as if he was going to kiss Riku’s cheek, then caught himself at the last moment and pinched him instead. “So naïve, Riku!”

Which was rich, coming from Sora of all people, but Riku let it go because he looked hot saying it.

But the best part of the night was finding Roxas, in a simple black and white suit, tucked into a corner with Kairi, who was wearing a pearl-colored lace dress with an open back. They were holding hands.

“You guys are my favorite couple,” Riku said with a shit-eating grin that only widened when they jolted apart like they’d been doing something worse than talking. “Honestly, you’re so cute.”

“I can’t believe I ever slept with you,” Roxas grumbled.

“ _Hey_ ,” said Sora. “He’s great in bed.”

“I know,” Roxas said flatly. “And even if I didn't, I can hear you two through the walls. All. The. Time.”

“Um, we don’t have to take that from you!” Sora’s voice went up an octave. “‘Oh. Oh, _Kairi_. Oh, yeah, that’s so good.’”

Kairi cracked up. Roxas glared at her, betrayed.

“What?” She grinned. “You _do_ sound like that, and I _am_ so good.”

It had been almost six months, and Riku still couldn’t believe that Roxas and Sora had actually moved in with each other. He especially couldn’t believe that it was actually working. Despite their different personalities, despite the fact that they’d been in not one but two love triangles, they lived together incredibly peacefully. Sure, once Sora had been fingering Riku, and Roxas had screamed through the wall, “Oh my fucking god, it’s 3am, just suck on his balls and end this!” But, other than that, there hadn’t really been any issues and it was nowhere near as awkward as Riku had been expecting it to be when Sora had told him about it.

“How long until you two sneak out, anyway?” Kairi asked. “I’ve never once seen you stay the whole night, Riku.”

“Probably within the hour,” Riku admitted. “I mean, _look_ at him.”

Both Kairi and Roxas glanced at Sora. Then, as one, they said, “Eh.”

“He’s a terrible influence on you, Kairi,” Sora said. “I look good, and you both know it!”

Riku laughed as he led Sora away so Kairi and Roxas could have their privacy. He couldn’t help shooting one last glance over his shoulder, though, and smiled as he saw Roxas tuck a lock of Kairi’s lightly curled hair behind her ears and kiss her gently. It was beautiful, what Kairi managed to bring out in him. It was wonderful, how he looked at her like she was his world. He was so happy for both of them. Not as happy as he was for himself, but happy enough.

Sora dragged him back out to the balcony, which was now empty since Wakka, Tidus, and Selphie had wandered back inside. They both leaned over the railing to gaze down at the garden that made up the backyard of the banquet hall, standing just close enough that their elbows brushed.

“I’m glad everything worked out,” Sora said quietly. “I really started to worry we’d never have this again.”

“You always had me,” Riku reminded him, just as quietly. “And you always will.”

“Always is a long time. You gonna put a ring on it or something?”

Riku smiled into the night. “Always isn’t long enough.”

He could feel suspicious eyes burning a hole in the side of his face. “You didn’t answer my ring question, Riku.”

“I feel like I did.”

Riku turned and began to walk back toward the door, grinning at the, “Hey! Wait — _Riku!_ ”, that came from behind him. And because he knew Sora better than anybody else, he danced out of the way just in time to avoid Sora’s attempt to grab the back of his jacket and took off at a run into the crowd. He heard the pounding of footsteps behind him and laughed, almost excited to see what Moogle News would make of two grown men and rising star blitzball players tearing through a banquet hall like children.

Let them talk. He had everything he’d ever wanted back, and nothing else mattered.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all for the kudos and comments! I'm not going to lie, I'm considering an additional one-shot of snapshots set in this universe, but, alas, (a) my mom is still sick, (b) I'm about to go back on deadline and (c) I have another fanfic idea set in another universe (cough superheroes cough), so it could be a while. But I had a lot of fun writing this, so I hope you had fun reading it, too. :)


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